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analyzing the e-commerce law of the Republic of Korea for successful experience to consumer protection in e-commerce of Mongolia
Get PDFThesis(Master) -- KDI School: Master of Public Policy, 2021The primary goal of this research is to examine the current issues of consumer protection in Business-to-Consumer (B2C) e-commerce of Mongolia and to discuss what legal concepts and policies are needed to properly protect consumer rights in e-commerce, using the Republic of Korea as a model. In addition, it aims to develop recommendations as to how to build an effective legal environment in Mongolia. For this purpose, the study analyzes cases of judicial decisions, statistics and current legislation in both countries. The primary sources were from the concept and provisions of existing laws on protection consumer rights in e-commerce. The secondary data are obtained from various statistics, judicial decisions, press releases, relevant studies and reports. The research paper reveals that while consumer protection in Mongolia is in place for both offline and online transactions, there are some limitations in e-commerce. Thus, some narrow provisions that regulate new emerged issues in e-commerce were discussed from E-commerce Act of the Republic of Korea.I. Introduction
II. E-commerce policy and consumer protection of Mongolia
III. E-commerce laws and regulations in the Republic of Korea
IV. Analysis and recommendation
V. ConclusionmasterpublishedKhash-Erdene PUREVSURE
Ensuring Clean Water for All: Implementing a Tele Monitoring System to Better Manage Water Quality in the Republic of Korea(2007–2021)
Get PDFIn 1991, a toxic substance called phenol was discharged from an electronics factory into the Republic of Korea’s Nakdong River, poisoning the local tap water supply. That incident—and other similar catastrophes—forced the government to improve the management of hazardous materials being treated and discharged into Korea’s waterways.
Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, the Ministry of Environment made incremental progress in improving water management by tightening regulations on wastewater discharged into rivers. In 2007, however, the ministry decided a new approach was necessary to reduce the risk of pollution incidents occurring.
That year, the government launched a Water Quality Tele Monitoring System, requiring facilities that discharged wastewater to install devices that measured pollutant levels automatically and transmitted those measurements in real time to a control center operated by the Korea Environment Corporation, an organization affiliated with the Ministry of Environment.
To operationalize the new system, the government had to overcome capacity, coordination, and economic challenges. Free technical support and government subsidies drove high levels of compliance from companies that discharged wastewater—even from small businesses that faced relatively high compliance costs. The new approach—which was implemented iteratively over more than a decade—helped improve water quality across Korea. The average concentration of most major pollutants declined as the Tele Monitoring System expanded nationwide
Ethnicity is not public service destiny: The political logic of service distribution in South Africa
No full textMillions of South Africans in thousands of demonstrations have protested the unequal allocation of public services. Despite the African National Congress’s promise to reduce the disparities generated by apartheid, the level of public services remains highly uneven across the country. Most studies of service provision in Africa assume that politicians will target their co-ethnics; other ‘diversity deficit’ literature hypothesizes that a high level of ethnic diversity undermines service provision from the start. Rather than assuming that ethnicity underlies service distribution in Africa, we argue that explanations of service provision should first examine how political institutions incentivize politicians to choose what services to distribute and how to distribute them. Even in an ethnicized polity, ethnic targeting may not be a politician’s best strategy. We seek to explain the variation in service levels across South African municipalities and advance three hypotheses: (1) Municipal councillors in more ethnically diverse municipalities will form policy coalitions that produce higher service levels. (2) Due to their extensive powers and the possibility of being residual claimants to municipality resources, South African mayors will decrease services when they enjoy electoral safety. (3) The strategic interaction between councillors and their mayor helps to account for the variation in service provision across South Africa’s municipalities. We test our hypotheses with data from more than 1.37 million households and aggregated municipality-level measures and find strong support for all three hypotheses. Political institutions—not ethnic demography—drive policy choices and service outcomes
Well-being Analysis Favours a Virus-Elimination Strategy for COVID-19
No full textA well-being approach requires looking beyond COVID-19 deaths to compare the performance of elimination versus mitigation strategies as measured by other important supports for well-being. What do the data show? Our comparison based on 2020 data shows a virus elimination strategy to be more successful than other options, whether measured in terms of COVID-19 deaths, overall excess deaths, income, unemployment, trust, or mental and physical health. Countries that chose and followed a strategy of reducing community transmission to zero and keeping it there saved lives and better protected income and employment, all without obvious costs to either the social fabric or the mental health of their populations
A Study on the optimal model for the expansion of integrated supply system of customized industrial water to strengthen corporate competitiveness
Get PDFThesis(Master) -- KDI School: Master of Public Management, 2021Looking at the domestic industrial water supply system, a water service provider (local government or K-water) supplies only general-purpose industrial water (raw water, purified water, and settled water), and the consumer uses the water provided by the water service provider after additional water purification to suit its application (e.g., cooling water, boiler feed water, washing water, etc.) and water quality. Therefore, companies that require high-purity industrial water such as semiconductor, display, petrochemical, and precision machinery industries directly install and operate additional water treatment facilities at their own expenditure to supply customized industrial water (pure water, ultrapure water) required for product production.
Even though there are professional water supply companies that supply industrial water, high purity industrial water that requires additional water treatment is produced and managed by the manufacturer itself, raising product costs and production risks and weakening corporate competitiveness.
In particular, when a large amount of industrial water is required for product production, the supply of industrial water in a stable and affordable manner through improvement of the industrial water supply system is a very important factor in enhancing production efficiency and corporate competitiveness because the cost of the water has a large effect on the product cost.
Taking this study as an opportunity, if a specialized water service provider expands the introduction of a system that integrates and supplies customized industrial water required by manufacturing companies, it will be possible to prevent duplicate investment in facilities and to supply industrial water efficiently at a relatively low unit price. It could lead to an improvement in the competitiveness of companies.
For example, in 2011, quantitative results were also proven through the successful operation of a customized integrated industrial water supply facility (K-water Daesan Industrial Water Center) installed in the Daesan Petrochemical Complex for the first time in Korea. However, since then, the spread of the integrated industrial water supply system has been sluggish.
Therefore, in this study, through a feasibility analysis of project expansion and a review of the project implementation method, an optimal business model and implementation plan were suggested, and efforts were made to secure new driving forces.
The conclusions drawn through this study are summarized as follows:
From a locational perspective, it was judged that the existing national industrial complex, where demanding companies were concentrated, was suitable as a business target in many aspects, such as securing stable demand and linking with government policies (regeneration of aging industrial complexes).
From an economic perspective, there is a difference depending on the availability of financial support, fluctuations in benefits and total project costs, and the quality of water required by customers, but it turns out that it is possible to secure stable economic feasibility when the scale capacity of the integrated supply facility is 50,000 ㎥/day or more.
From a policy perspective, this project is in line with the policy direction of the country that wants to secure its own technology for high-purity industrial water treatment, and the willingness of the government and K-water to pursue the project is clear, so it is possible to secure sufficient feasibility if uncertainties are resolved through thorough preparation and the customized industrial water integrated supply plan is reflected in the relevant high-level plan (2040 national waterworks maintenance basic plan, etc.).
In addition, as a result of comparing the strengths and weaknesses of various business methods including the national finance project, it is judged that the promotion in the form of government fiscal projects led by the government and K-water will be the most advantageous in many aspects (e.g., deciding on flexible rates in consideration of acceptability, enhancing project execution power, achieving effective business goals, etc.).
Now is the time for K-water, a state-owned enterprise specializing in the water sector, to actively strive to enhance the execution power of the project by reflecting the plan to expand the introduction of Integrated Supply System for Customized Industrial Water in government policies and inducing financial and institutional support.1. Executive Summary
2. Introduction
3. Literature Review and Case Study
4. Research Methodology
5. Analysis and Findings
6. Conclusions and Recommendations
7. Limitations and Further Research to be addressed in the future
8. References
9. AppendixmasterpublishedKyung Yool R
Representativeness in the Eyes of the Citizen: Impact of Balanced Citizenship on the Perceived Representativeness in Participatory Governance
No full textRepresentativeness is one of the keys to the legitimacy of participatory governance. However, such representativeness might be in the eye of the beholder due to various definitions of, and criteria for, representativeness. This study aims to explore how citizens perceive the representativeness of their representatives and the reasons behind those perceptions. Based on a survey of 2,000 citizens in South Korea, the findings indicate: (1) the maturity of citizenship (i.e., balancing tolerance and participation) significantly influences citizens’ perceptions of the representativeness of public affairs participants, and (2) this pattern of perceived representativeness does not vary according to the representativeness type (i.e., stake, stance, service, specialty, sovereign, and socio-econ) and domain (i.e., community, corporates, and government). The findings imply (1) the existence of four distinct groups of citizens–considerate reformer, reserved endurer, silent groaner, and active grumbler–and (2) the four groups of citizens are predictors of perceived representativeness.1
The Impact of COVID-19 Regional Cash Subsidies on the Sales of Local Businesses in South Korea
Get PDFThis paper examines the impact of the regional cash subsidies which were granted in some districts in addition to the national universal stimulus payment in South Korea related to the COVID-19 pandemic. We evaluate the effects of the cash distribution per resident on aggregate credit and debit card sales and sales by industry using the difference-in-difference method. The increment in card spending due to the cash subsidy is about 1.58%p in total, and this effect is concentrated within a single month. The consumption stimulating effect is prominent among (semi)-durable goods that do not require close interactions between customers and sellers. In contrast, the effect is relatively small in the high-contact face-to-face service sectors and restaurants, areas the COVID-19 pandemic hit directly. On the other hand, some service sectors where customers could wear face masks, such as education and fitness, experienced a substantial sales boost due to the cash subsidy
Effects of Easing LTV·DTI Regulations on the Debt Structure and Credit Risk of Borrowers
Get PDFWith CB data in South Korea, this study examines whether the credit risk of borrowers changes when the regulation on bank mortgage supply is relaxed. We analyze the effect of deregulation on LTV and DTI limits in the Seoul-metropolitan area in August 2014 with a difference-in-difference approach. We find that the probability of delinquency is lower in the Seoul metropolitan area after the deregulation than in other urban areas. The effect is noticeable among low-income and low-credit borrowers. We also find that borrowers change their debt structure to reduce the interest costs utilizing their improved access to bank mortgages. The findings suggest the necessity to consider the burden of the high interest costs of unsecured loans for debtors with low incomes and low credit ratings in designing housing finance regulations
The Legacy of State Repression on Contemporary Trust: Indiscriminate versus Targeted Repression in Soviet Russia
Get PDFIndiscriminate state repression leaves long-term negative consequences on interpersonal trust and trust in state institutions. In this paper, we investigate whether a variation in density of Soviet police forces, which governed the level ofselectivity in repression execution, lead to heterogeneity in long-term trust response to repression. Similar to other studies, we find that both horizontal trust and vertical trust are negatively associated with indiscriminate repression exposure in the past. However, our results suggest that the magnitude of the negative effect diminishes with repression executed in a more selective fashion proxied by the intensity of the perpetrator’s deployment. Surprisingly, we find that trust response might even inverse to positive in localities where the state repression had been accompanied by a perpetrator’s presence at extremely high levels, i.e., when the state could ensure highly selective repression. Overall, our findings propose that the legacy of totalitarian regimes on horizontal and vertical trust might depend on the state’s capacity to execute repression with more or less precision against perceived enemies
A Study on the Tax Payment imposed on the North Korean people
No full text이 글에서는 북한 주민들을 대상으로 부과되는 세부담 실태와 특징을 실증적으로 고찰하였다. 이를 위해 우선 세부담과 관련 개념을 검토한 뒤 시장화 진전과 동시에 형성된 시장의존형 세부담 제도에 대해 설명하였다. 이어 북한이탈주민 13명에 대한 면접조사내용을 토대로 세부담의 다양한 실태와 특징을 분석하면서 김정은 정권의 국가재정 유지 및 국정운영에 적지 않은 비중을 차지하고 있는 것으로 추정되는 주민들에 대한 세부담 부과 수준과 범위를 추론하는 데 기여하고자 하였다. 북한이탈주민들과의 인터뷰를 통해서 확인된 세부담에서 세(稅)의 범위는 실로 다양했다. 결론적으로 김정은 정권 출범 이후 세부담은 더욱 진화, 발전되어 이제는 개별적이고 파편화된 단계를 넘어 보다 조직적이고 제도화된 수준에 이른 것으로 추정된다. 이번 연구에서는 세부담 양태를 보여주는데 그쳤지만 세부담은 다양한 측면에서 분석이 필요한 중요한 주제이기 때문에 세부담 증대와 국가 재정 간 관계 등에 대한 지속적이고 주의 깊은 관찰이 필요하다. 본 연구는 북한 내 주민들의 세부담을 주제로 한 선행연구가 많지 않은 상황에서 세부담의 개념, 유형, 특징 등을 체계적으로 정리하고 그 의미를 분석했다는 점에서 관련 분야 연구의 기초자료로서 의미가 있는 것으로 평가된다.
This paper examined the facts and characteristics of tax payment imposed on the North Korean people. After reviewing the various concepts of tax payment in North Korea, the market-dependent tax burden system that was formed with the progress of marketization was explained. Based on the interviews of 13 North Korean defectors who experienced tax payment while living in North Korea, summarized were various conditions and patterns of tax payment systems. The tax burden by residents is considered to be at a significant level in maintaining national finances in the Kim Jong Un era. The scope of the tax burden identified through the interviews mainly included electricity and water bills, electricity usage fees, and various membership fees paid by the members of organizations such as the Women's Alliance and the Youth League. In summary, since the inauguration of the Kim Jong Un regime, the tax burden on North Koreans has evolved and developed further, and is now estimated to have reached a more organized and institutionalized level beyond individual and fragmented stages. The study has only investigated the patterns of the tax burden on ordinary people in North Korea, but since it is an important topic that requires in-depth analysis, needed is continuous and careful observation of the relationship between increased tax burden and government’s finance.2