Home › Articles› Abstract
Research Article

Taiwanese Economic Growth and the Heavy and Chemical Industrialization: A Comparison with South Korea

Jun Hyeon Cho

Sogang Institute for East Asian Studies, Sogang University

Published: August 2004 · Vol. 23 No. 2 · pp. 75-109
Full Text

Abstract

The success in economic development of East Asian NIES, including South Korea and Taiwan, is often compared with the failure of Latin American countries. Then there are some misunderstandings, such as the success of East Asia and the failure of Latin America, which need to be decided from each development strategy itself. These misunderstandings cause other prejudices which regard as if the reverse of economic position of the two areas had been decided already in the 1960s. But most of Latin American countries were keeping higher income level and productive capacity than East Asian NIES until latter half of the 1970s. It was the early 1980s that economic reverse between the two areas appeared. It is sure that Export-Led Development strategy is still basic in East Asian NIES since the 1960s. But, there was an important strategic conversion in Korea and Taiwan in the 1970s: that is, Heavy and Chemical Industrialization. The very crucial point in evaluating economic success of East Asian NIES including Korea and Taiwan is that they have continued high growth more than 30 years, and factors of such long-term growth can not be explained only by Export-Led Development strategy of the 1960s. There are two points in this paper. First, the reverse of economic position between East Asian and Latin American countries, which had appeared since the 1980s, is owing to the success of export-oriented Heavy and Chemical Industrialization of Korea and Taiwan during the 1970s. Second, Korea and Taiwan industrial and export structures have been standing its essential aspects since 1980s, and this basic structure was formed by Heavy and Chemical Industrialization of the 1970s.
Keywords: Heavy and Chemical IndustrializationTaiwanese EconomyNIES