What makes Seoul? Back in town after a 10-month absence, I have been obsessed with the question as I meet old friends and visit places that feel as familiar as the town I was born in.

I have toyed with the question before, but the struggle to find an answer seems more intense this time. To answer the question, I have been working on the outlines of a “theory of Seoul” that can explain the past and present while offering a window into the future.

I have always thought of Seoul as a jumble. The rapid pace of economic development created endless construction that churned the city, leaving it a jumble of new and not so new with flashes of old here and there. As people poured into Seoul, the city could not build roads and infrastructure fast enough, leaving little left to invest in the cityscape.

In thinking about Seoul, it is easy to forget that it is also a postcolonial city, a postwar city, and a post-dictatorship city. During the Japanese colonial period (1910-45), the city was turned into an administrative center that served the needs of the colonial rulers rather than the Korean residents. The Korean War damaged much of the city, which was already overflowing with refugees. After talking power in a coup d’etat in 1961, Park Chung-hee aggressively pushed industrialization, which triggered the long economic boom that thrust Korea into the ranks of advanced nations. Democratization in 1987 brought an end to dictatorship and completed Korea’s march toward advanced nation status.

The thread that runs through the colonial period and years of military dictatorship is a focus on private interest over public purpose. Except for a few highly symbolic public buildings, the rulers allowed Seoul to develop for the private interest of landowners who built and traded real estate for profit. Public buildings were used to project ruling ideology and to direct limited public funds to friendly construction companies.

The idea of private interest and public purpose was developed by American historian Arthur Schlesinger, Sr. to explain political change in American history. Schlesinger argued that American history followed a cyclical pattern of government activism that focused on the public good followed by a quiet period of reduced government activity in which private activity dominated.

Since the late 1980s, democracy has planted deep roots in Korea, but the paradigm of private interest over public purpose in Seoul largely continues to this day. Many conflicts over redevelopment that began in the 2000s, for example, were a conflict between landowners and developers seeking profit and larger public concerns such as historic preservation. The push toward redevelopment began to fade in the 2010s because of the weakening real estate market.

The role of self-employment in the Korean economy is also important. Among the 34 OECD countries, Korea ranks fourth in the rate of self-employment after Greece, Turkey, and Mexico. In 2013, 27.4 percent of workers in Korea were self-employed, compared with 11.5 percent in Japan and 6.6 percent in the U.S.

The largest group of workers in Korea, the self-employed are a powerful, though often silent, interest group. The large percentage of self-employed in Korea means that they need commercial space and that restrictions on the use of commercial space favor the shopkeeper.

A walk through any neighborhood of Seoul lays bare the emphasis on private interest over public purpose. The streets, many of which do not have sidewalks or space demarcated for walking, are lined with shops displaying overpowering signs. Most of the shops are barely profitable and have to complete for the same pool of customers. Gated apartment complexes have green spaces that are usable only by residents.

Slower growth, an aging population, and high levels of education are gradually forcing public purpose to the fore as people place greater importance on quality of life. Historic preservation and the creation of interesting public spaces has become more important. The recently opened buildings in Jongno-1-ga, for example, recreate the atmosphere, albeit imperfectly, of Pimatgol and display archaeological relics unearthed in the construction process.

Perhaps the most noticeable manifestation of the new interest in public purpose is the project to turn the overpass near Seoul Station into a green park with ramp access to the surrounding neighborhood. Another example is the plan to revitalize the Seun Sangga instead of tearing it down for redevelopment. Small-scale plans involving reuse, repurposing, and reinterpretation of existing buildings are appearing throughout the city.

All of this means that Seoul may be entering a new era in which the creative energy of the city is put to work for the public good as never before.

By Robert J. Fouser

Robert J. Fouser, a former associate professor of Korean language education at Seoul National University, writes on Korea from Ann Arbor, Michigan. -- Ed.