Urban ‘Scenes' and Local Development: The Case of Seoul

Abstract

This research focuses on applying the new concept of ‘urban scene’ to the metropolitan city of Seoul. In particular, the paper purports to determine the relationship between urban scenes and local development. In so doing, the paper first describes the concept of urban scene and its importance in urban sociology. The paper suggests three dimensions of scenes, legitimacy, theatricality, and authenticity, with specific examples and indicators. The basic argument of the urban scene approach is that we need to put more emphasis on the consumption aspect of the city, especially on cultural consumption. Thus, the city is now a place of consumption rather than a place of residence or production. Based on the theoretical discussion of urban scenes, the research draws a map of ‘Seoul Scenes’ in terms of five different sub-dimensions of urban scenes: traditional, glamour, bohemian, ethnic, and global scenes. To do so, various amenity data were collected for all of the 424 dong’s’ of Seoul, mainly from the Electronic Yellow Pages and the Business Registration Data of the Statistics Bureau. Using the amenity data, five detailed scene maps of the Seoul metropolitan area were drawn using the ARCGIS program. The results show that the part of Seoul north of the Han River (called ‘Kangbuk’ in Korean) is more traditional and the part south of the Han River (‘Kangnam’ in Korean) is more glamorous and global. In the next step, this study analyzes how scenes can influence the values and identities of the residents. By combining the scene map and Seoul Survey data, the research finds that those who live in the scenes with the highest scores, especially glamour, bohemian, and global scenes, have more professional occupations and tend to be more sensitive to cultural consumption. This suggests that the areas with the highest scene scores can better attract the creative class and have a higher possibility of job creation and economic development. Finally, the research discusses the relationship between scenes and housing prices. Using the apartment price data of Seoul city, the research shows that distribution of apartment prices in Seoul is significantly affected by the scene factors.