Theses and Dissertations Collection

This study presents a case study in the construction and discursive practices of geostrategy in statecraft. The ‘New Economic Map on the Korean Peninsula’ (NEM) is considered as being formed in the broader historical context of South Korea rather than as a product of the present Korean administration. A long-standing geopolitical discourse of South Korea has defined the Korean Peninsula as a place of risk/opportunity positioned between land and sea powers. Such a discourse contextualizes the Peninsula as the site of the ideological confrontation during the Cold War. However, successful economic development and the reinforcement of the economic connectivity in East Asia during the Post-Cold war period has recontextualized the Peninsula as a land of new opportunity. This type of geopolitical discourse backgrounds geopolitical conflict and foregrounds geoeconomic cooperation in the construction and discursive practices of the geostrategy. Even though the political partisanship in South Korea adheres to opposite perspectives regarding political engagement with North Korea, all parties agree with the geopolitical hope involved through the economic cooperation with North Korea. First, I consider how critical geopolitics is increasingly concerned with the economy in the discursive practices of statecraft and historicize the NEM by reviewing the works of the Korean elites. Then, I analyze the discourses circulated in the Korean media around a series of events in the Korean peace process, presenting how geopolitical and geoeconomic discourses and logics resonate with the ones of the NEM.