China meets Jeju Island: provincializing geopolitical economy in East Asia

Abstract

This article presents Jeju Island, the largest island in the Korean Peninsula, as a spatial ensemble newly constructed by various geopolitical and geoeconomic forces in East Asia. A new urban model called the Jeju Free International City has integrated China's growing presence as a geoeconomic opportunity for local economic development. Yet, the subsequent establishment of Jeju Naval Base is premised on the vision of China as a new geopolitical threat that should be addressed. This incoherence results from the problematic articulation between the geopolitical-economic imaginations of the central government and economic development imperatives of the local growth coalition. This paper draws upon recent discussions of geopolitical economy and calls for provincializing geopolitical-economic analysis. The operation of zoning technologies in Jeju Island has been closely associated with the promotion of the contradictory visions of China's rise, and as a result fails to reconcile geoeconomic and geopolitical discourses, practices and desires.