• Journal of the Korean Geographical Society
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• v.38 no.2
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• pp.298-311
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• 2003

Building the new administration capital city, one of presidential candidate Moo-Hyun Rho's election pledges, is now listed as a priority national policy agenda of the Participation Government. However, so many people's negative attitudes ranging from cynical skepticism to firm objections against the national policy agenda may threaten its smooth policy actualization. At this juncture, this paper attempts to present persuasive arguments and discuss some critical issues to be considered for building the new administration capital city successfully. The paper begins with taking a look at the current state of hyper-concentration of Seoul agglomeration area and its harmful effects, paints a vision of 'an evenly developed country as a whole' via illustrating the vision from the Swiss case, and reviews the performance of the precedent governments' reform measures for rectifying the hyper-concentration of Seoul agglomeration area. And then, the paper argues for building the new administration capital city as a potent solution to the problem of excessive concentration of activities in Seoul agglomeration area, as well as a driving force to spur the government to realize the Participation Government' enthusiastic vision: 'a decentralized and evenly developed country as a whole' and 'the hub country in the Northeast Asia'. In addition, the paper discusses the location of the new administration capital city in connection with the forthcoming national unification. Lastly, the paper deals with the important issues such as the procedure of people's approval, the population size and legal status of the new administration capital city, the relationship between building the new administration capital city and decentralization reform, etc.