Journal of the Korean Geographical Society ISSN:1225-6633(Print) 대한지리학회지

This paper investigates the social and political construction of geographical scale in conjunction with Korean housing politics. Recently, attention has been drawn to the issue of the social and political construction of geographical scale. Spatial scales have increasingly been regarded as socially constructed and politically contested rather than ontologically pregiven or fixed. The scale literature has paid attention to how different spatial scales can be used or articulated in social movements, with an emphasis on ‘up-scaling’ and ‘scales of activism’ rather than ‘downscaling’ and ‘scales of regulation.’ Furthermore, the scale literature has focused on the aspect of empowerment. However, it is worthwhile to examine how scale ? especially ‘down-scaling’ and ‘scales of regulation’ ? can be used not only for marginalizing or excluding unprivileged social groups, but also for controlling the (re)production of space, including housing space. Under a regulatory regime, the Korean central government gained more control over the (re)production of housing space at geographical multi-scales by means of ‘jumping scales,’ specifically ‘down-scaling.’ The Korean central government has increasingly obtained the capacity to ‘jump scales’ by using not only multiscalar strategies for housing developments, but also taking advantage of various scales of institutional networking among the central and local governments, quasi-governmental institutions, and Chaebols, across the state. Traditionally, scale has been regarded as an analytical spatial unit or category. However, scale can be seen as means of inclusion (and exclusion) and legitimation. Choosing institutions to include or exclude cannot be separated from the choices and range of spatial scale, and is closely connected to ‘scale spatiality of politics.’ Facilitating different forms of ‘scales of regulation,’ the Korean central government included Chaebols and upper- and middle-income groups for the legitimization of housing projects, but excluded local-scale grassroots organizations and unprivileged social groups as decision-makers.