South Korea

The Republic of Korea, commonly known as South Korea, is an East Asian country on the southern half of the Korean Peninsula. Korea traces its founding to 2333 BC by the legendary Dangun. Korea has traditionally had the strong characteristics of a career civil service system (Kim 2010). Its origin dates back to the Unified Shilla Dynasty, about 1,200 years ago. During this era, King Wonseong (AD 788) operated a national examination system, a kind of limited competition structure used to select civil servants. The system allowed only people who had finished studying classics such as the Analects of Confucius to take the examination (Kim 2006). Until the nineteenth century, Korea had a formal class system. Under this system, only the privileged could enter the government. Becoming an official meant achieving good social and economic status. This tradition survived even after the class system was abolished and constraints were lifted on the qualifications to enter the civil service (Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development 2005).