The Korea Local Administration Review

This study examines the controversy concerning the Policy for Balanced Regional Development in Korea and Japan. The main arguments of the Balanced Regional Development in Korea and Japan seem to be unsustainable in the international comparison of related data. The financial difficulties of the central and local governments after the Global Crisis as well as the fundamentally changed business environment in the course of the globalization are the essential grounds of the paradigm transition in Japan. It can be suggested that the traditional approach of Balanced Regional Development is to be sublated to the extended autonomy of regions.