민주화와 복지정치의 변화:국민기초생활보장법 제정과정을 중심으로

Abstract

This paper examines how welfare politics has changed after the democratization in Korea focusing the case of enacting National Basic Livelihood Security Law. Korea established a modern public assistance system with the legislation of the Law in 2000. However, it is increasingly open to doubt whether the National Basic Livelihood Security scheme is playing its expected role. This paper argues that the under-functioning of the scheme is related to founding process of the enforcement ordinance and enforcement regulations of the Law after the passage of the Law in the National Parliament. In other words, while the universalism and progressiveness of the scheme represents the influence of civil society organizations up to the legislation of the Law, the liberal and residual character of the practical enforcement system embodies the results of bureaucratic politics among the ministries in the administration. The political process of establishing National Livelihood Security Scheme shows, 1) that since the democratization in Korea the civil society organizations became influential significantly mainly due to the underdevelopment of political parties’ function of interest representation; 2) Despite the democratization, the power of the president was still decisive in decision-making in the Kim Dae-Jung government, and; 3)the developmentalist ideology is being merged with the neo-liberal ideas in the decisionmaking process in the government.