In 2006, the national competitiveness of Korea plunged to 38th in a world competitiveness survey.
According to this year's IMD World Competitiveness Yearbook published by the International Institute for Management Development (IMD) in Switzerland, Korea's competitiveness dropped by nine notches from the previous year's due to such factors as protectionism, stiff labor-management relations, and race and sex discrimination.
In a recent survey on national brands too, Korea ranked the world's 25th. In comparison to its economic standing as the world's 10th or so ranking, the national brand or competitiveness seems to be out of place. What could have brought about such an occurrence
The true meaning of advancement signifies the attainment of a certain level with respect to the three-legged cauldron of politics, economy and culture forming an equilibrium when each balances one another. Our nation has succeeded in bringing about industrialization and democracy in the shortest period of time in the history of mankind. Still, our standing in terms of cultural maturity is appraised to be falling behind those of advanced countries. Due to such backwardness of culture, national brand power and competitiveness are lagging compared to its economic size.
Ray Cline, a political scientist of the US, has defined national power as the sum of tangible national power multiplied by intangible national power, which in turn can be expressed as P= (C+E+M) (S+W), where C is critical mass (including population and territory), E is economic capacity, M is military capacity, S is the national strategy coefficient, and W is national will. Due to the difficulty of measuring, intangible national power is normally regarded as the Arabic numeral one. In this case, national power generally refers to tangible national power. In other words, national power is measured by adding the measurable variables of population, territory, economic and military capacities. Whereas the national power whose components are tangible is use in figuring out strong and weak countries in outwardly form, intangible national power is measured through mostly qualitative analyses. For instance, and as shown by the IMD survey, those countries whose competitiveness have been found to be weak despite relatively immense landmass are confined with such factors as stiff labor-management relations, high wages, excessive social security burdens, and inconsistent government policies.
In the case of small countries whose competitiveness are strong are affected by such factors as easy access to government services, human resources with global mind-sets, transparency, and efficient university education. As the age of culture based on software powers progresses, and along with continued digitalization of information, it is certain that intangibles, instead of tangible assets or national power, will gradually account for an ever more share in the national power equation.
In the case of Finland, home to Nokia, the mobile giant with the largest share of the world's mobile market, the country has a population of less than 5.2 million with hardly any natural resources other than forestry. Moreover, the nation's cold winter season lasts half a year. Nevertheless, about 83 percent of the country's youngsters complete higher education. Moreover, Finland has eight women ministers out of eighteen cabinet ministers, and has the largest IT cluster in northern Europe. The political system based on equality and trust, together with specialized industry strategies, has made Finland a strong small nation. Another case of a strong small nation can be found in Switzerland.
For a nation without much natural resources to speak of and with a territory half the size of South Korea's, the reason behind Finland enjoying one of the world's top GDP can be found in the fact that it has promoted precision machinery, finance and tourism as strategic industries. And tax policies elevating labor's will to work have placed the country on the eighth rank in a national competitiveness survey.
The people's will within a nation also plays an important role in enhancing national power. Israel has a history of winning against the coalition of Arab states during the Third Arab- Israeli War thanks to the will of united people together with brilliant strategies of the Israeli military. Our nation, too, has overcome the financial crisis through concerted efforts by all its people.
Moreover, we were able to get the top four during the World Cup soccer games under the wholehearted support of the people to the surprise of the world. This is an example which shows an increase in national power through a temporary elevation of people's will. Even though it takes time for tangible national power to be increased, intangible national power can increase from zero to infinity within a short period of time.
The world in which the large devours the small has now been transformed into one where the fast devours the slow. The cultural age of the 21st century is shifting under the paradigm of from the cold to warmth under the speed of light after the periods from large and long to small and short. In other words, what this means is that cold digital contents are heartened with warmth and then transmitted at the speed of light. Only the capability to swiftly cope with today's changes can raise national competitiveness in an era where knowledge, information and capital are moving at the speed of light.
National strategies to swiftly and actively cope with the changes of international affairs, economy, environment, culture, and technology are essential in ever-growing fierce international competitions.
The cultural strategy for Hallyu (Korean Wave) in particular is certain to play the role of incorporating the nation into a worldly cultural power following Korea's successes in becoming an industrial and democratic nation. By taking such steps, it can also play the role of raising brand images of the nation and of rapidly increasing intangible national power.
The worldwide spread of Hallyu will bring about the spin-off effect of expanding the intangible territory along with the rise in the number of Hallyu fans. The attainment of national competitiveness in par with Korea's economic scale implies the balanced development to a global level in not only political and economic dimensions but also cultural respects, too. When this happens, and as James Dator, the godfather of futurology, has predicted, Korea will become the first nation to enter into the Society of Dreams through a Digilog in the latter period of information age.
