Implications of Korea's Democracy Assistance Experience as a Global Narrative

[Editor's Note]

As many developing countries require assistance in their democratization processes and the consolidation of democratic institutions, South Korea is positioned to serve as a bridge between developed and developing nations by sharing its knowledge and experience in democracy and political reform. Professor Kim Tae-gyun of Seoul National University explains the main components of South Korea's democracy assistance, the methods for sharing its democratic experience, and the challenges and strategies South Korea must address moving forward. Through this, the author argues that South Korea must provide a crucial compass for the direction of its democracy based on its own experience and leverage democracy assistance as an asset to be recognized as a symbol of peace and democracy in East Asia.

I. South Korea's Position in Global Democracy

South Korea became a member of the club of developed donor countries upon joining the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) in 2010. In 2021, its status shifted from the developing country list to developed country status at the 68th session of the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The improvement in South Korea's international standing is attributed to its successful economic growth, driven by rapid industrialization, which led to its entry into the top 10 global GDP rankings in 2021. However, efforts to re-examine South Korea's role in the international community, focusing on its history and experience of democratization and political development alongside economic progress, remain insufficient. The international community pays attention not only to South Korea's economic miracle but also to its democratization miracle. Many developing countries seek to benefit from South Korea's experience in democratization and the consolidation of democratic institutions to aid their own democratic transitions and institutional reforms.

South Korea is in a position to act as a bridge between developed and developing countries by sharing knowledge and experience in democracy and political reform with developing nations across various dimensions. Firstly, like most developing countries in the Global South, South Korea has experienced colonialism, independence, and nation-building. In the context of gaining independence from Japanese imperialism following the end of World War II in 1945, the First Republic was established in 1948, marking the beginning of nation-building and, concurrently, the division of the peninsula. This historical experience significantly overlaps with that of many developing countries. Secondly, South Korea has the historical experience of war, having endured the Korean War from 1950 to 1953. This allows it to share experiences in peacebuilding and post-conflict development with developing countries that have experienced or are currently experiencing conflict or civil war. Thirdly, South Korea has experienced two military coups in 1961 and 1979, military dictatorships, and the subsequent process of democratization in 1987 and its consolidation. In particular, the recent military coup in Myanmar and the ensuing democratic crisis, as well as the issues of military dictatorship and government corruption prevalent in Africa, can offer significant insights through the storytelling of South Korea's civil society's contributions to democratic consolidation. Lastly, South Korea's historical trajectory, marked by the division of the Korean Peninsula and continuous efforts toward peacebuilding, offers lessons for countries experiencing ideological conflict.

The narrative of political development, encompassing colonialism and independence, war and reconstruction, dictatorship and democratization, and division and peacebuilding, which South Korea has compressed into its modern history, will be a compelling experience and knowledge for partner countries in the Global South. South Korea is likely the only country in the world to have transitioned from a developing to a developed nation in terms of political development and democracy in a relatively short period. For these reasons, the international community calls upon South Korea to act as a mediator between developed and developing countries, and developing nations seek to learn from South Korea's know-how in driving political system reforms.

The task of crafting a narrative of South Korea's political development and democratization experience differs from that of projecting this experience onto the support provided to developing countries. The former, as an internal political-historical narrative, does not require consideration of relationships with third-party partner developing countries. The latter, however, necessitates considering developing countries as recipient partners from the perspective of South Korea as a donor country. The sharing of South Korea's democratic experience has not been a central issue in overseas aid focused on economic and social development, and thus has not occupied a mainstream position in South Korea's Official Development Assistance (ODA) or other forms of international cooperation projects. The reason why the sharing of democratic experience has not been a core agenda item for South Korean ODA is that political agendas such as democratization, peace, and human rights have not been recognized as important as economic/social development sectors and agendas within the content of South Korea's international development cooperation projects. Furthermore, the political sensitivity arising from the concept of 'democracy aid' also plays a significant role. There is a possibility that democracy aid could be utilized as political intervention, where donor countries demand democratization as an aid conditionality before providing assistance or impose their own democratic values onto recipient countries. Indeed, there is a considerable uncomfortable truth in history where major powers like the United States unilaterally provided democracy aid to promote democratization in authoritarian developing countries. In other words, the definition and institutionalization of democracy are political processes that organically emerge as cultural products based on the local conditions of recipient countries, not projects that can be imported and transplanted from abroad. Therefore, the storytelling of South Korea's democracy assistance experience has not received systematic attention from South Korean international development cooperation agencies and academia due to two factors: its limited prominence in aid policy compared to economic/social development, and the inherent political sensitivity of democracy aid itself.

Nevertheless, it is true that South Korea has undertaken development cooperation projects aimed at fostering values related to democracy and improving institutions, such as supporting the strengthening of governance functions of developing country governments and enhancing the capacity of civil society. Although a unified system for democracy aid has not yet been established, organizing the content of democracy aid at the current stage, the methods of sharing with recipient countries, and identifying limitations and areas for future improvement will hold significant meaning as a narrative for South Korea's democracy assistance experience, given that various development cooperation agencies have contributed to improving democratic institutions in developing countries in their own ways.

II. Main Contents and Implementing Agencies of South Korea's Democracy Assistance

Democracy assistance has been established as a form of foreign aid policy, primarily led by the United States after World War II, aimed at transitioning the political systems of allies and friendly nations towards democracy. Theoretical and empirical research on various conceptual analyses and components of democracy assistance shares an approach that categorizes the content of democracy assistance into electoral processes, state institutions and systems, and civil society domains, as shown in Table 1 below. This categorization focuses on content related to the establishment, reconstruction, and consolidation of democratic institutions in recipient countries, rather than on the political provision of democratic values and ideologies by donor countries. South Korea, having transitioned from a recipient to a donor country, from a developing to a developed nation, and from authoritarianism to democracy in a short period, has demonstrated strengths in knowledge sharing and training programs related to institutional reform, and the content of South Korea's democracy assistance to date has largely concentrated on instrumental institutional reform and improvement, as well as capacity building for their maintenance and management. Specifically, democracy-related institutional support has been planned through projects focused on public administration and electoral system improvements. In the civil society domain, support for civil society organizations (CSOs) in recipient countries has aimed to strengthen their advocacy roles and service delivery functions. With the proclamation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, the Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) has focused on strengthening multi-layered cooperation centered on the core values of SDG 16, based on the linkage between the content of democracy assistance (rule of law, institution building, peace, accountability, etc.) and SDG 16, and has concentrated on SDG 16 programming strategies and implementation.

<Table 1> Democracy Assistance Template [1]

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In South Korea, ODA sectors or areas have not yet been discussed under the name of democracy assistance. Furthermore, the methods of democracy assistance projects planned in South Korea are not organized with a unified concept and systematic approach. Consequently, the scale of budgets for democracy-related aid projects and the selection of project content vary by institution, exhibiting a fragmented nature. Despite this fragmentation, the methods and donor entities implementing South Korea's democracy assistance can be categorized into three sectors as presented in Table 1.

In the area of electoral processes, the National Election Commission has played a key role, sharing South Korea's experience and knowledge with election management bodies in developing countries to enhance their capacity and support the establishment and development of democracy and the improvement of electoral management systems in transitional democracies. Starting in 2006 as a training program for election officials from developing countries commissioned by KOICA, the National Election Commission's support for developing countries began. Since 2013, it has been included in the ODA budget of the National Election Commission, with training programs conducted at the Electoral Training Institute. In 2014, the Association of World Election Bodies (A-WEB) was established in Incheon, and the Electoral Training Institute's training programs were initially co-implemented by A-WEB as a sub-grantee. Since 2016, A-WEB has taken full responsibility for the training programs. The main content of the training programs includes presentations on the current status of election management in developing countries, sharing key issues, discussing best practices in election management, conducting case analyses with experts from international organizations, and developing action plans for improving election management suitable for each country's situation. As can be seen in Table 2 below, the budget for the training programs conducted by the Election Commission and A-WEB has been reduced by more than half since 2019 compared to 2018, which is a factor that undermines the sustainability of South Korea's democracy assistance.

<Table 2> Trends in Budget for Training Support for Enhancing Electoral Management Capacity in Developing Countries

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Secondly, in the domain of state institutions, ODA support for public administration and judicial systems in developing country governments can be summarized through South Korea's case. South Korea's democracy assistance in the public administration sector has been primarily planned and implemented by KOICA. KOICA has strategized public administration as one of its priority sectors for its grant aid since 2010. However, from 2021, the existing public administration sector was reorganized into 'Peace and Governance,' and detailed strategic objectives for the mid-term strategy were established. Currently, the detailed strategic objectives for the Peace and Governance sector include (1) preventing armed conflict and laying the foundation for peaceful lives (Peace), (2) expanding participatory and inclusive democracy (Governance), (3) establishing safe and just judicial and policing systems (Governance), and (4) building accountable and efficient administrative systems (Governance). While the previous public administration sector focused on projects such as improving civil servant training systems, modernizing administrative systems through e-governance, and modernizing tax administration, since 2021, there has been a trend towards expanding the scope of democracy assistance to include areas like expanding democracy and peace. In this context, key programs are being planned to enhance political accountability to citizens by improving local administrative capacity to increase access to administrative services for local residents, enhancing anti-corruption and transparency through strengthening audit capacity, and establishing fair electoral systems and voting mechanisms. Furthermore, to improve the inclusivity of laws and systems, key programs include promoting the rule of law by strengthening the capacity of the judicial sector's human resources and institutions, protecting the human rights of women and vulnerable groups, enhancing policing capacity for peace promotion and the creation of a safe society, and ensuring civil and social rights. As mentioned earlier, KOICA's key programs in the Peace and Governance sector are planned based on South Korea's know-how in improving public administration systems, the core values of SDG 16, its programming strategies, and the phased introduction of a human rights-based approach.

<Figure 1> KOICA's Peace and Governance Sector Support Scale by Year (2016-2019, Unit: Million KRW) [2]

Figure 1 shows that the total scale of support for KOICA's Peace and Governance sector over the four-year period (2016-2019) has been steadily increasing. The support amounts for each year were 99.6 billion KRW in 2016, 101.7 billion KRW in 2017, 123.7 billion KRW in 2018, and 127.4 billion KRW in 2019. Compared to the total support amount for each year, the support for the Peace and Governance sector accounted for an average of 16.7%, specifically 15.6% in 2016, 16.0% in 2017, 18.1% in 2018, and 16.9% in 2019. The stable support proportion of 15-18% for the Peace and Governance sector indicates a continuous demand for projects from partner countries, highlighting the importance of the Peace and Governance sector for ensuring individuals' safe and sustainable lives. Nevertheless, considering that the budget allocated by KOICA to the public administration sector in the 2000s accounted for approximately 23-24% of the total budget, a reconsideration of the current budget scale is necessary.

According to the sub-objectives ([Figure 2]) set forth in the mid-term strategy for 'Peace and Governance' that KOICA plans to establish and operate from 2021, the proportion of total aid disbursed in the peace and governance sector over the past four years (2016-2019) allocated to each detailed strategy reveals that an overwhelming 81% of the 'Governance' objective has been directed towards the legislative, judicial, and executive branches, represented by participatory and inclusive democracy, safe and just judicial and policing systems, and accountable and efficient administrative systems, respectively. Only about 19% of the aid has been allocated to the peace sector. Examining the allocation among the detailed governance objectives, the 'Administration (accountable and efficient administrative systems)' sector received the largest share at 62%, followed by the 'Judiciary (safe and just judicial and policing systems)' at 19%, and the 'Legislation (participatory and inclusive democracy)' at 5%. This confirms that improving administrative systems and strengthening capacity for public administration through training programs have been the core components of KOICA's democracy aid initiatives to date, and that the administrative system improvement and public administration sectors can be evaluated as the content of democracy aid in which Korea holds a comparative advantage.

Figure 2. Aid Scale by Sub-Objective in the Peace and Governance Sector (Unit: Million KRW)[3]

In addition to KOICA, institutions such as the Judicial Research and Training Institute, the Korea Institute of Public Administration, and local governments are active as domestic aid agencies supporting national institutions, government systems, and public administration in developing countries. Most of these institutions contribute to capacity building and knowledge sharing by conducting training programs for public officials from developing countries, leveraging their respective expertise. The Judicial Research and Training Institute, through its International Judicial Cooperation Center, aims to strengthen judicial exchange and cooperation with developing countries by enhancing judicial systems and promoting judicial independence and social integration in recipient countries through foreign judicial training and ODA projects targeting developing countries. In 2020, it conducted training programs and online seminars for the judicial research and training institutes of Nepal and Uzbekistan. Similarly, the Korea Institute of Public Administration primarily implements training programs for public officials from developing countries and joint research and consulting projects with domestic and international organizations. However, its budget is significantly smaller compared to KOICA. Local governments have gradually expanded their international cooperation projects, which were initially conducted as friendly exchanges with local governments in developing countries, with a small budget. In July 2021, the International Development Cooperation Committee decided to increase ODA support from local governments, and their activities in the public administration sector are expected to expand in the future.

Third, the civil society sector, drawing on the benefits received from international organizations such as Misereor, the Asia Foundation, and Germany's EZE during Korea's democratization period, has also been engaged in various activities to support civil society activities in developing countries. Firstly, KOICA provides funding to CSOs through its civil society cooperation projects. These projects aim to improve the quality of life for residents in partner countries by collaborating with private partners, including civil society organizations, academic partners, and social economy organizations, to reduce poverty and promote welfare in developing countries. The budget trend shows a continuous increase: 26.7 billion KRW in 2017, 27.1 billion KRW in 2018, 29.4 billion KRW in 2019, and 37.6 billion KRW in 2020. Meanwhile, based on OECD DAC CRS codes, KOICA's support for public administration accounts for 41.86% for public policy and administrative management and 29.12% for public administration, totaling approximately 71%. Excluding public administration, the budget for democratic governance, particularly cooperation with civil society, is extremely small, with allocations for elections (0.18%), anti-corruption bodies and institutions (0.37%), strengthening civil society organizations (0.44%), human rights (0.23%), and gender equality (2.37%).

Furthermore, the Korea NGO Council for International Development Cooperation (KCOC), a representative consultative body for Korean development cooperation CSOs, is another important related institution contributing to democracy aid in the civil society sector. According to KCOC, as of 2019, 27 organizations collaborated with local CSOs in developing countries across 31 countries, implementing 111 projects. The project budget consisted of 6.8 billion KRW (97.3%) from their own funds and approximately 180 million KRW (2.7%) from government funds, indicating a very minimal level of government support. Meanwhile, the Korea Democracy Foundation, active in the civil society sector, plays a leading role as a democracy commemoration institution contributing to the mutual promotion of international civil society, discovering individuals who contributed to Korea's democratization movement abroad and promoting related commemorative projects, and enhancing youth participation and international cooperation through public diplomacy for democracy. However, despite these missions, the budget available for implementing project content remains very small.

Regarding support for the institutionalization of labor unions and labor-management relations, the Korea Labor and Management Development Foundation, under the Ministry of Employment and Labor, has been conducting development cooperation projects in developing countries since 2011, sharing its expertise in labor-management relations, labor policy, and labor environment improvement policies through its international exchange and cooperation support projects. These international exchange and cooperation projects include providing employment and labor-related specialized services to domestic companies expanding or planning to expand overseas, as well as supporting foreign employment education and promoting cooperation projects with international organizations such as the ILO. However, the Korea Labor and Management Development Foundation also faces a severe budget constraint, with an average annual budget of approximately 800 million KRW allocated to its international exchange and cooperation support projects.

Overall, the development cooperation content corresponding to the democracy aid currently provided by Korea can be assessed as falling under all sectors of the internationally recognized democracy aid template ([Table 1]): electoral processes, state institutions/systems, and civil society. It is confirmed that the core content of Korea's democracy aid primarily lies in knowledge sharing and training programs, such as institutional improvement and policy development. However, this is accompanied by three major issues. First, it is difficult to argue that Korea's democratization experience is adequately discussed and reflected in the current sectors of democratic governance, necessitating the supplementation of narrative elements to construct storytelling based on Korea's experience. Second, because each aid-providing agency does not jointly develop or integrally manage the planning and implementation of content, it is difficult to expect organic linkage or synergy effects between electoral processes, state institutions/systems, and civil society. Third, the issue of small budgets, commonly faced by Korean democracy aid-related institutions, will highlight the need for mobilizing financial support from the government and civil society as a prerequisite for future narrative projects on democracy aid experience.

III. Modalities of Sharing Korea's Democratization Experience

Alongside the analysis of democratic governance content provided by Korean development cooperation agencies, it is necessary to understand the modalities through which this content is shared with partner countries. For convenience, focusing on KOICA, which implements the largest portion of democracy aid, the modalities through which KOICA's democracy aid projects are shared with developing countries can be categorized as follows ([Figure 2]).

Figure 3. Aid Scale by Project Type in KOICA's Peace and Governance Sector (Unit: Million KRW)[4]

Examining the aid scale by project type in KOICA's peace and governance sector over the four-year period from 2016 to 2019, it is confirmed that aid was provided in the following order: project-based assistance (45.4%), training programs for invited trainees (16.8%), volunteer programs (17.8%), development consulting (10.5%), public-private partnership projects (4.0%), international organization cooperation projects (3.1%), small-scale grants (2.1%), and humanitarian aid (0.3%). Project-based assistance is the most common type of project in the peace and governance sector. Country-specific cooperation projects, including development consulting, small-scale grants, and project-based assistance, account for approximately 60% of the total. This implies that project discovery, such as establishing and improving legal systems and frameworks at the request of recipient governments, is the most common approach. In other words, partner governments can officially request support for institutional improvements based on Korea's democratization experience through Korea's grant aid country-specific cooperation projects. However, it is difficult to accurately ascertain the extent to which recipient governments request specific aspects of Korea's democratization experience from the Korean government, given the prior sharing of knowledge about Korea's past democratization and the role of civil society advocacy. Furthermore, in the case of capacity building for public officials through training programs for invited trainees, activities such as raising awareness of democratic governance, human rights, and gender issues, and cultivating expertise in electoral systems, state institutions/public administration, and civil society are actively conducted, indirectly contributing to democracy aid.

Meanwhile, domestic CSOs have continuously criticized the low level of support for public-private partnership projects, which are cooperation projects with civil society, accounting for only 4.0%. In 2019, the "Basic Policy on Government-Civil Society Partnership in International Development Cooperation" was signed between the government and civil society, emphasizing that Korean civil society contributes to policy formulation and implementation in international development cooperation for both donor and recipient countries, ensuring public participation and fostering democratic societies. To this end, cooperation with civil society in developing countries will be expanded, and the government plans to increase financial support for civil society's public-private partnership projects. Moving forward, based on the 2019 Basic Policy, efforts are expected to continue to realize storytelling unique to civil society, such as knowledge-sharing projects on Korea's democratization and peace movement experiences, which can be expanded.

In addition to country-specific cooperation projects and support through civil society, there are modalities of support where KOICA collaborates with third partners, such as cooperation projects with international organizations and humanitarian aid. However, cooperation projects with international organizations account for only 3.1% of KOICA's total peace and governance project budget, and humanitarian aid accounts for a mere 0.3%. In the case of cooperation projects with international organizations, UN agencies and multilateral development banks encourage Korea to share its economic and political development experiences with other developing countries, and they are expanding projects to develop and provide the Korea Development Experience Sharing Program (KSP) to partner institutions in developing countries. Developed countries prefer the multi-bi approach, where funds are channeled through international organizations rather than directly to recipient partners, and are increasing financial support. As aid procurement through non-contact methods is emphasized following the COVID-19 pandemic, cooperation projects with international organizations and humanitarian projects are expected to gain prominence. Therefore, multilateral aid and Korea's democracy aid experience and know-how show potential for active connection. Furthermore, given that the nature of KOICA's peace and governance projects requires the participation of various stakeholders, project types need to be diversified in the future.

Finally, an approach linking Korea's democracy aid delivery modalities with concessional aid should also be explored. In terms of building infrastructure for democratic systems and institutional improvement, it is important to mobilize concessional aid for providing infrastructure services, such as media centers or broadcasting systems, rather than relying solely on grant aid focused on technical cooperation and knowledge sharing. However, institutional efforts to link Korea's democratization experience with concessional aid have not yet begun, and conceptual discussions remain in their nascent stages.

IV. Limitations and Response Strategies: Challenges for Korea's Democracy Aid

The effort to refine the content and delivery modalities of foreign aid, which supports democratization in developing countries and helps establish healthy democracies by sharing Korea's democratization experience with them, holds significant meaning for both Korea as a donor country and its partner recipient countries. To systematically and constructively advance the storytelling of Korea's democracy aid in the future, it is crucial to identify the current limitations and explore corresponding response strategies.

First, it is necessary to establish domestic institutional frameworks and build knowledge networks for sharing Korea's democratization experience through public-private-academic cooperation. Many Korean development cooperation agencies may still be unfamiliar with the concept of democracy aid, and terms such as peace, human rights, gender, refugees, civil society, and governance are used individually, although they are similar to democracy but not unified. While there is no need to forcibly integrate these terms, it is important to establish a loosely connected knowledge network to share information on various democracy aid projects, avoid duplication, and foster cooperation. Furthermore, in addition to the government-civil society partnership, academic research and consolidation should be linked to the knowledge network platform to organize the narrative of democracy aid experience. Creating a foundation for various stakeholders to participate in the democracy knowledge network will foster a learning effect that reflects diverse voices in approaching Korea's democratization experience.

Second, it is necessary to seek an aid strategy that supports democratic governance at a whole-government level. Rather than attempting to establish a "Korean-style" democracy aid model that could be perceived as a condition for aid by developing countries, efforts should be focused on improving the support system to help establish democratic governance that realizes individual freedom, human rights, protection of minority rights, and the rule of law within the historical and political contexts faced by recipient countries. The establishment of such democratic governance is expected to enhance the resilience of recipient countries to overcome internal and external crises, leading to more substantial socio-economic aid effects. It is necessary to systematically refine Korea's development aid, which has demonstrated strengths in institutional improvement and public administration, connect it to the universal language of development cooperation such as effective democratic governance building, and expand the content and modules of Korea's democracy aid. To this end, a system must be institutionally established to control the political sensitivity of democracy aid and prioritize understanding recipient country needs in project discovery and democracy aid strategy.

Third, to systematically contribute to the global development of democracy, it is necessary to codify it through legislation. Although the term 'democracy' is not explicitly used, Korea is already contributing to the development of democratic governance in the international community through various programs and projects. Therefore, it is important to institutionalize this contribution in a more systematic, integrated, and effective manner. Legislative efforts will enable systematic support for the development and resilience of democracy in developing countries and will help increase the scale of financial resources within a legal framework, compared to individual budget acquisition by currently fragmented domestic project entities. Legislation on democracy aid can contribute to planning and implementing projects that reflect more specialized and in-depth consideration of democracy than current projects, and can also contribute to the development of domestic democracy capacity by fostering reflection and education on democracy for domestic organizations participating in democracy aid projects, as well as for recipient countries' democracy. Specifically, as legislative efforts for democracy aid, 'promotion of democracy' can be added to Article 1 of the current law, the Framework Act on International Development Cooperation, and specific implementation measures can be stipulated in the subordinate decrees, such as the 'Basic Plan for International Development Cooperation' or the 'Comprehensive Implementation Plan for International Development Cooperation.' Furthermore, a law establishing a fund or foundation for democracy support could be enacted to specialize in democracy support projects.

Fourth, beyond legislation establishing democracy support, the creation of a democracy fund with relatively free financial support could be explored to enable various institutions to pursue democracy aid. As discussed earlier, most democracy aid-related institutions, excluding KOICA, operate with extremely limited budgets, leading to unsustainable projects. It is important to explore ways to create and autonomously manage financial resources through private funds, in addition to increasing government budgets, to support development cooperation projects for democracy support. Currently, there is no foundation in Korea dedicated to sharing Korea's democratization experience with developing countries and supporting democracy in developing countries. Although the 'ASEAN Human Rights Fund Act' was proposed in the National Assembly in May 2021, legislative efforts are needed for democracy support across all developing countries, beyond funds and foundations limited to specific regions.

Fifth, to support democratic governance in partner countries, channels that enhance the engagement of local civil society must be expanded. Since recipient governments are unlikely to request politically sensitive democratic institutional reforms from Korea, Korean support is needed to expand the capacity and opportunities for local civil society to raise issues of democratic governance and engage in institutional reform. Civil society organizations in recipient countries can more directly publicize various issues in areas of democratic governance, such as anti-corruption, freedom of the press, and human rights advocacy, than governments. They can also request support from the Korean government for improving democratic governance or engage in cooperation with Korean civil society organizations through solidarity.

Sixth, due to the diverse and fragmented nature of the entities and modalities involved in transferring Korea's democratization experience, there is a problem of unsystematic linkage of related statistical data. Unifying statistical data among institutions is urgent, and the knowledge network platform mentioned earlier could be responsible for managing statistical data to facilitate smooth communication of data and information.

Seventh, to create a unified narrative of Korea's democracy aid experience, it is crucial to establish a foundation for continuously accumulating the unique expertise and experience of each aid agency through institutionalizing them as Knowledge Sharing Programs (KSP). Through KSP, it will be possible to provide consulting support for democracy institutional improvements, human rights-based approaches, and gender issue responses in the manner desired by developing countries. However, the current KSP projects operated by the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Korea Development Institute (KDI) are primarily based on Korea's economic development experience, clearly limiting their scope to encompass Korea's democratization and socio-political development experiences. Therefore, actively utilizing KOICA's Development Experience Exchange Partnership Programme (DEEP) is currently the most realistic approach.

Eighth, efforts should be made to expand partnerships to enable various actors to participate in development cooperation projects that share Korea's democratization experience. This can be expanded beyond knowledge sharing in democracy through civil society solidarity to include support for parliamentary system improvement through parliamentary participation, and fundraising through private sector participation and fostering private enterprises in developing countries.

Ninth, it is important to emphasize that sharing and cooperating on Korea's democratization experience with developing countries is not merely providing Korea's unique experience but is linked to universal democratic values recognized by the international community. Efforts should be made to strengthen multi-layered cooperation centered on the core values of the UN's SDG 16 and to emphasize that Korea's democracy aid projects are in the same context as the SDG 16 implementation programming strategy and its execution. Furthermore, efforts should be made to embed human rights-based approaches, environmental and social human rights impact assessments, and the principle of accountability in the planning and execution of Korea's democracy aid. Based on this, multilateral cooperation methods with international organizations (such as multi-bi arrangements or trust funds) can be more actively explored.

Finally, the implications of Korea's democracy aid experience as a global narrative should provide an important compass for the direction that Korean democracy aims to pursue at a macro level. In East Asia today, politics centered on the realist national interests of major powers such as the United States, China, Japan, and Russia are in sharp conflict, and discussions on peace and democratic governance are easily offset by the protection of national interests due to issues such as North Korea's nuclear program, territorial disputes, and historical grievances. Korea has reached a point where it should aim to play the role of a 'Nordic country in East Asia' based on its historical experience of democratic governance, and democracy aid should be utilized as an asset of soft power to gain recognition as a symbol of peace and democracy in East Asia. ■

[1] Thomas Carothers, Aiding Democracy Abroad: The Learning Curve (Washington, D.C.: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 1999), p, 88.

[2] KOICA Grant Aid Statistics (2016-2019)

[3] KOICA Grant Aid Statistics (2016-2019)

[4] KOICA Grant Aid Statistics (2016-2019)

■ Author: Kim Tae-gyun_ Professor, Graduate School of International Studies, Seoul National University. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Oxford, UK, and the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), USA. His main research areas include international development, peace studies, international political sociology, and global governance. His major works and edited volumes include "The Korean State and Social Policy: How South Korea Lifted Itself from Poverty and Dictatorship to Affluence and Democracy" (Oxford University Press, 2011), "Antagonistic Coexistence: Asian Reproduction of Global Accountability" (Seoul National University Press, 2018), and "Critical Korean International Development Studies: A Developmental Reflection on International Development" (Parkyoungsa, 2019).

■ Management and Editing: Yoon Ha-eun EAI Researcher

    Contact: 02 2277 1683 (ext. 208) | hyoon@eai.or.kr