남북경제협력의 국제법적 측면: 법과 정치

Since 1990s, the Economic Cooperation between two Koreas has raised some legal issues concerning the World Trade Organization agreements, the Free Trade Agreements, the protection of Korean investors in North Korea, export controls of dual-use goods, and economic sanctions. As all of these issues have some legal characteristics of international law, most of law scholars have naturally tried to solve the issues mainly from the perspective of law. However, it proved that the sole and/or pure legal approach to the issues can give us a little help in understanding and solving the real international political matters concerning the Korean peninsular, for example nuclear situation in North Korea, which are both of critical and pre-conditional in solving the issues. Without solving the political matters previously, it would be practically impossible to solve the legal issues. In this sense, a law and politics approach is indispensible to evaluate exactly the effectiveness of domestic laws and legal policy concerning economic cooperation between two Koreas. Surely, it is undeniable that the economic cooperation between two Koreas is highly needed to settle peace on the Korean peninsular. However, it should be noted that South Korea's unilateral appeasement policy toward North Korea can not always guarantee the success of the two Koreas' economic cooperation in seeking Korean future reunification.