환경문제를 둘러싼 지역갈등 해소 및 거버넌스 강화 방안

Abstract

Resolving Regional Environmental Conflicts and Enhancing Environmental Governance Interregional conflicts concerning environmental issues have been regarded as significant and serious social problems. Although the local self-governing system of Korea based on interregional mutual respect and trust has been established over ten years, interregional environmental disputes such as water conflicts between upstream and downstream regions are still in progress. Taking into account recent environmental problems such as global climate change, the future interregional environmental conflicts of Korea are expected to exacerbate over time. With such urgency in mind, this research attempts to understand the past environmental conflicts of Korea and find appropriate methods to establish and enhance environmental governance suitable for Korean society. Extensive studies on environmental disputes have in fact been undertaken, but many tend to adopt the particular approach of introducing relevant instruments for conflict resolution and analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of those instruments by comparison. Although this approach has its own advantages, it poses limitations on effectively reflecting the real world where actual conflicts are taking place. In order to overcome such limitation and search for the explanatory variables that help the understanding of the inherent characters of environmental conflicts in Korea, this research utilizes a content analysis method, designed to investigate the Korean newspaper editorials that have been published for the past eleven years. Grounded on the classification framework developed by this study, namely 1) relationship issue, 2) value issue, 3) circumstantial/emotional issue, 4) factual issue, and 5) structural issue, the causes of the past environmental disputes in Korea have been identified as having been linked mostly with structural issues. Following structural issues (49%), the causes are based on relationship issues (17%), value issues (14%), circumstantial/emotional issues (9%), and factual issues (8%) in that order. This trend shows that the past environmental conflicts of Korea were tractable rather than intractable. From a strategic point of view, in other words, if Korea had focused on structural issues in response to environmental disputes rather than on value issues, relationship issues, circumstantial/emotional issues, or factual issues, it would have more effectively coped with those conflicts. This research explores the three types of interregional environmental disputes in Korea, all of which are closely related to water conflicts (Woonmoon Dam, Namgang Dam and the restoration of flood sites). The selection of these cases is attributed to the fact that water supply and distribution (Woonmoon Dam and Namgang Dam) and water management (the restoration of flood sites) are deeply intertwined with structural issues, a relationship which illustrates clearly the past environmental conflicts of Korea. First, the case of Woonmoon Dam is concerned with water distribution between the cities of Daegu and Ulsan and has the possibility to become a real dispute, even though conflicts have not yet come to the surface. Second, the materialization of conflicts is now actively in progress in the case of Namgang Dam, a dispute over water distribution between the city of Pusan and Gyeongsangnam-do, the southern part of Gyeongsang province. Third, for conflict situations that have already been resolved, the case of the restoration of flood sites examines several kinds of projects involved with restoring the diverse flood sites of Korea. The restoration project of flood sites is assumed to bring about conflict situations in the future along with global climate change. Thus, it is expected that the part of the flood sites restoration projects of this research would be a useful source, which is helping determine the future direction of the national restoration policies of Korea. According to the results, the case of Woonmoon Dam shows that governance has to be established and administered across all the categories indicated in the classification framework developed by this research. In other words, governance concerning the water distribution of Woonmoon Dam could work as an effective mechanism for conflict resolution when the followings are realized: 1) pre-adjustment of views between local governments and the smooth compliance of established national policies (structural issue), 2) trust-building between local governments (relationship issue), 3) compromise between interested parties with different standpoints (value issue), 4) overcoming the selfish emotion of local residents (circumstantial/emotional issue), and 5) identifying whether data is true or not (factual issue). With regard to the case of Namgang Dam, three conditions are required to utilize the governance of conflict resolution. First, the national government has to officially reserve the plan, which is currently pushing forward, and arrange a forum for facilitating discussions between interested parties, including the national government, the city of Pusan and Gyeongsangnam-do. Second, the city of Pusan, the main interested party over the water dispute of Namgang Dam, has to make its position clearer on the issue of whether it will receive water source from the Nakdong River. Third, an objective re-examination of the maximum water supply limit of Namgang Dam should be conducted. On the basis of the three aforementioned conditions, debates over the issues of whether the intake of water source from the Nakdong River should be maintained and of how water source in emergency could be secured in the city of Pusan have to take place. Based on the outcome of these debates, a forum for reflecting public opinions should be arranged. In the case of the restoration of flood sites, the key elements of governance are differentiated for mountain rivers, rural rivers, urban rivers, and tidal rivers. "Mutual cooperation" and "opinion adjustment"have been identified as the common components of governance required in restoring all types of rivers. However, the third key element of governance is different for the various types of rivers: the component for mountain and rural rivers is "sharing objective" the component for urban rivers is "consultative network," consisting of experts, nongovernmental organizations, and local governments last, the element for tidal rivers is "trust" between major stakeholders. Simply put, even though the core component of governance might be differently prioritized depending on the kinds of rivers, it is crucial to note that all the components indicated above should be considered concurrently in performing the restoration projects of flood sites.