The growth of cultural industry and the role of government : the case of Korea

Abstract

The 21 st century is the age of culture. Cultural industry is rapidly internationalizing and a number of countries seeking a new source of economic growth are now turning their attention to cultural industries. In Asia, there is a phenomenon called the "Korean wave," which refers to the popularity of Korean pop culture in Asian countries since the late 1990s. Korea's cultural industry enjoyed rapid growth due to the rise of the Korean wave, and the popularity of Korean pop culture has benefited the country in a number of ways. However, the Korean wave appears to be ebbing in recent years and there are growing anti-Korea sentiments in countries like Japan and China. This thesis examines whether the Korean government's support in promoting the growth of the cultural industry has been effective and identifies the key driver industry that facilitated the rise of the Korean wave. Among the ten sectors designated as cultural industries by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Korea, I select three sectors for analysis: music, film, and broadcasting. Based on the export data from government agencies, it is predicted that the government support has had some positive effects on export growth in the film and the broadcasting sector, but not very much on that in the music sector. Also, it is likely that the key driver industry was the broadcasting industry, in which television dramas account for a large portion of exports.