Was your university worth it? - comparing expectations and aspirations of university graduates

Education in South Korea has been carrying a deeper significance then a dissemination of knowledge. Both historically and culturally education has been profoundly intricated with socioeconomic value that receiving education itself even entailed certain social class significance. Such value of education created a separate socio-educational class, called hakbeol, which is still rampant in the modern Korean society (Jung, 2014). Particularly after the Korean War in 1953, the role of education extended to being an anecdote to various social ill, from uniting the divided nation to reconstructing the destructed economy (Kim, 2004). Naturally such extended role of education was also re-shaping the meaning of HE and HEI as well. The values of education, HE, and HEI are socially recognized and, thus, are well-known. However, whether HE and HEI, specifically of undergraduate level, are appropriately fulfilling its role is remaining unanswered, which this research seeks to answer. This dissertation utilised semi-structured interviews with 17 participants to analyse aspiration and expectation participants had before university and after attending a Korean university. By examining how interviewees had prepared for university, what, and why, the study analyses what kind of aspiration participants incorporated pre-entrance to university and how the aspirations are shaped. The majority of participants claimed they had economic aspiration before entering university. Expecting HEIs to guarantee graduate premium either through HC or Signaling, participants were aspiring to have their life preparation completed with the entrance to university. Some participants (3 out of 17) noted they had no expectation before entering university. However, HEI was not an ending for their employment preparation, but, in fact a new beginning, a steppingstone. Due to such disparity in the degree of universities financial assurance, participants experienced a reality hit that led to psychological voidness, or even to depression. Therefore, in investigating the role of HEIs in contemporary Korea through the perspective of those who had experienced university, HEIs is serving as an employability shaping institution either by knowledge or its name value

The Current State of Equity Investments by Foreign Funds [in South Korea] and Related Legal Issues

On September 15, 2004, the South Korean press gave extensive news coverage to a series of private individual “Question & Answer” session meetings which the Capital Group Companies Fund (“Capital Group”) held with many of the top chief executive officers (“CEOs”) of major Korean corporations. Known worldwide as a top U.S. private equity management company, the Capital Group is currently the largest institutional investor in South Korea. As a major shareholder of large corporations such as Samsung Electronics, the Shin Han Financial Group, SK Group, and Hyundai Motors, the U.S. investment firm invited their CEOs to address questions and seek answers concerning the corporations’ overall performance and business trends. The fact that the CEOs readily accepted the Capital Group’s invitation reveals just how great of an influence foreign investment funds exert on corporate management and governance of major corporations in South Korea. News of Sovereign Asset Management (“Sovereign”)’s clash with SK Corporation (“SK”) in early 2004 has also been well publicized, highlighting foreign funds’ willingness to participate in company management in South Korea. After having acquired 14.99% of SK Corp. shares, the European private equity fund took a hostile turn against SK Corp.’s management and controlling shareholders. At SK Corp.’s annual shareholders meeting held in March 2004, Sovereign submitted a shareholder proposal seeking to elect new candidates for the board of directors and to amend the company’s articles of incorporation, culminating in a bitter proxy contest between Sovereign and SK Corp. This Article explores the current state of investments by foreign funds in South Korea and examines related legal issues. Part I briefly summarizes the basic concepts and types of investment funds. Part II examines the current status of securities investments made by foreign funds in South Korea. Part III examines several key legal issues in connection with such investments

Influence Of Choice Context On Consumer Decision Making In Global Electronic Commerce

The objective of this paper is to understand how choice context will influence the decision making process of consumers when shopping at electronic shopping malls. This paper provides a framework for exploring context effects on consumer judgment and choice processes in the special case of electronic commerce. First an outline of the judgment process is presented which is used to identify the stages where the context effects may occur. Theliterature in experimental and social psychology, behavioral decision theory and consumer research are selectively reviewed for evidence regarding context effects on judgment. The approach adopted in this paper borrows directly from at least two converging sources : the cross-functional research in judgment and decision making in consumer behavior and cognitive psychology and the research in marketing issues in electronic commerce. The managerial implications of this research are answers to questions such as how best can the firm exploit this new form of transacting business to maximize its leverage in the market place and increase its market share. The academic contribution of this research on context effects is that it helps to reconcile two diverging research streams on judgment and choice (the economic perspective and the behavioral perspective)