A Tale of Jeju Island's Dream Tower Resort: The Dark Shadow Left Behind by Foreign Investment
From the horizon of secluded Jeju Island rise the twin 38-story towers of the Dream Tower Resort. This "foreigner-only" casino and resort has dramatically altered the island's skyline, standing as a monument to the dangers of foreign capital investment. As a UNESCO site that bears the “triple crown” status of Biosphere Reserve, a World Natural Heritage Site, and a certified Global Geopark, Jeju Island is one of the most ecologically unique locations in the world. Yet, as emeritus geography professor Gregory Chu points out, this delicate ecosystem and local culture have been the target of a rapid development campaign. In the last 20 years, Jeju’s leaders have set out to shape it into a free international city like Hong Kong or Singapore. They have marketed its rare UNESCO status in a bid to draw foreign investors and tourists from the 268 million people that live within a 2-hour flight of the island. Their success is measured by the external capital that has transformed the delicate island of Jeju into a globalized touristic colonial extraction site, jeopardizing its local identity and fragile ecology.
The push for development on the part of the central government of South Korea and Jeju’s provincial government has led to a massive expropriation of local resources. In 2010, Jeju began an investment immigration system, which granted pre-permanent resident status to any foreign investor purchasing at least $500,000 worth of real estate in Jeju. In the years that followed, between 2011 and 2014, Chinese land ownership skyrocketed by 483.7 percent, according to Hyun-Soo Lim. The rush for Jeju real estate by foreign investors created a demand surge and subsequent price spikes. These investors have developed condominiums marketed to wealthy foreign tourists, and out of the price range of locals. The “foreigner-only” Dream Tower casino complex itself cycles capital between Chinese investors and destination tourists, effectively excluding locals from economic exchange. As new “residents,” investors rarely live on the island and contribute little to the local economy.
In concert with the surge in foreign investment, the tourism industry has rocketed exponentially and has impacted Jeju’s biodiversity, habitat quality, and climate. In 1990, Jeju Island welcomed a record high of nearly three million tourists. By 2000, that number more than doubled to 6.5 million, and by 2023, it doubled again to 13.34 million. The influx of tourists and the rapid development of infrastructure to support them has led to dramatic changes in the use of land and biological resources. Between 1989 and 2019, land use classified as “urban” increased 170 percent overall. The semi-mountainous zones of the island saw an increase of 60 percent, and the island’s delicate coastal land was transformed into urban land at a rate of 130 percent. Researcher Liang Ma, from Princeton University, indicates that land-use change is among the greatest threats to biodiversity, which is a hallmark of Jeju Island. The transformation of natural landscapes into urban areas disrupts ecological processes, reduces biodiversity, and contributes to climate change. The rapid increase of urban land also means the rapid decrease of forest land, grassland, wetland, and water; all elements of high-quality habitat. This is a phenomenon that the local residents have been aware of for years, as a 2015 survey indicated that 60.2 percent of residents agreed that immediate measures need to be taken to protect Jeju’s natural resources. The intentional marketing of Jeju as an ecological treasure has been overly successful, to the point that ecotourism is gradually consuming and destroying the very object of attraction.
The corporate development of Jeju has not only scarred the land but also its locals, leaving them to wonder who the ultimate beneficiaries of Jeju’s capitalization will be. Tommy Tran, who wrote his UCLA doctoral dissertation on the transformation of Jeju Island, has noted that foreign capital penetration has had numerous effects on the local community. Exclusive investment patterns have gentrified neighborhoods and resulted mostly in condominiums directed at the $500,000 visa-range buyer, well out of reach of locals. Tran reports that there is a growing sentiment that locals are “being pushed out or becoming outsiders on their own island.” Hyun-Soo Lim records that real estate on Baozhen Street has risen 50 to 250 percent since 2011, and some estimate that rent increases 50 to 100 percent when real-estate transfers from Korean to Chinese ownership, leading to numerous accounts of local tenant evictions. Foreign investment has also begun to strain essential services such as healthcare. Chinese developers, the Greenland Conglomerate group, have also developed Jeju as a center for medical tourism as well, building Korea’s first for-profit hospital: The Jeju Healthcare Town and Resort. On an island where residents lack access to any high-level general hospitals, this resort offers relaxation and skincare, as well as cosmetic and plastic surgery to international tourists.
In response to a rapidly developing colonial economy of extraction, exclusion, and dispossession, Jeju Island’s locals might look to the example of Barbuda in the Caribbean as a way to reclaim their right to the land. The inhabitants of Barbuda have historically challenged the global exploitation of natural resources and local populations. Since their emancipation from British slavery in 1834, the Barbudans have clung to collective ownership of the land as a way to protect themselves and their island’s natural beauty against colonial extractionism. This longstanding tradition was codified into law in 2007 with the Barbuda Land Act, which stipulates that Barbudans have a right to inhabit and make use of the land collectively and that it cannot be sold. Plans for development over dollar amounts must be approved by a popular vote. This collective land ownership has essentially protected Barbuda from the environmental harm and gentrification of the mass tourism industry that has affected other Caribbean nations. Barbuda’s policies have irked foreign investors, and the Barbudans have consequently received considerable pressure to revoke their collective ownership of the land. The catastrophe of Hurricane Irma in 2017 has been used as a pretense to curtail collective land ownership and allow foreign capital to rebuild the island. In response, Barbudans have developed a grassroots resistance movement to projects funded by corporate capital that expropriate the land. As Barbudans struggle to maintain their rights to their country, they provide a framework for Jeju Island. A form of collective land ownership that provides the people a right to their island and a say in whether and how foreign investors may profit from the island’s resources and its people may slow the rapid gentrification and environmental degradation of Jeju. Although this method would decrease the profitability of the island, it would direct capital accrual to Jeju’s local inhabitants who also have the greatest incentive to protect the delicate ecology of their home. Jeju’s special self-governing status could provide a way for such laws to be developed, even in the face of the laws created to increase foreign investment.
Jeju Island is a microcosm of the global struggle between corporate interests which see land in terms of profits and local populations who see it in terms of their home. Placing power back into the hands of those who actually inhabit the land through grassroots movements results in more sustainable, inclusive, and integrated economies and ecologies.
