A Shift Towards Integrated and Adaptive Water Management in South Korea: Building Resilience Against Climate Change

Minha Lee, Heejung Kim (), Jin-Yong Lee, Jae E. Yang and Chungwan Lim
Additional contact information
Minha Lee: Kangwon National University
Heejung Kim: Kangwon National University
Jin-Yong Lee: Kangwon National University
Jae E. Yang: Kangwon National University
Chungwan Lim: Kongju National University

Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), 2022, vol. 36, issue 5, No 7, 1625 pages

Abstract: Abstract There is growing evidence that the global meteorological cycle, on which most countries depend for water security, is deviating from traditional patterns due to climate change. The global response to this has been to adopt more integrated water resource management (IWRM) and adaptive management (AM) approaches, but the question of ‘how’ remains largely unanswered. This is because ‘one size fits all’ no longer applies, as IWRM and AM denote flexible, situation-tailored, and area-specific management systems. Understanding how water policy in a region or country has historically evolved and sometimes failed, offers a good starting point to shed light on the next step or ‘how next’; however, this aspect remains underexplored. This study focuses on South Korea, one of the medium-high water stress countries affected by climate change. For a structural and theoretical analysis, the Hall’s theory of paradigmatic policy change was applied, which revealed that South Korea is currently in the ‘contestation’ stage following the ‘fragmented authority’ stage due to failures in the ‘policy experiment’ stage. The analysis identified continued administrative rigidity and a construction-centric culture as the main causes of the failure of transition attempts made during 1994–2013. Hence, to answer the ‘how next’ question, this study proposes that the IWRM and AM be institutionalised in South Korea through the educational system at all levels, by enhancing the learning process and cultural adoption. Without garnering general support, the structural reforms of 2018–2020 can be overturned easily if the next government endorses traditional values.

Keywords: Integrated water resources management; Adoptive management; Hall’s theory of paradigmatic policy change; South Korea (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11269-022-03071-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:waterr:v:36:y:2022:i:5:d:10.1007_s11269-022-03071-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/11269

DOI: 10.1007/s11269-022-03071-x

Access Statistics for this article

Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA) is currently edited by G. Tsakiris

More articles in Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA) from Springer, European Water Resources Association (EWRA)
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().