Problem overview:

     Awareness and visions: Surprisingly, in Korea, the media along with NGOs provided the leadership in building a national vision on environment.

     International commitments: The Rio Declaration recommended that each country establish a vision for the 21st Century. Accomplishing this, in an integrated, participatory way has proved to be a major social and political challenge for Korea.

Background in summary:

     The Korean government was slow in developing environmental awareness: The vision is an enlightening, dynamic, and evolutionary process. Vision is needed when a society is confronting a serious challenge that cannot be met with conventional value and method. Therefore, vision needs some form of leadership and foresight. Unfortunately, political leadership in Korea has not taken any progressive role in making visions for sustainable development.

     Influencing factors that have triggered environmental awareness and vision in Korea: In Korea, the vision for sustainable development is generated through diverse channels including NGOs, the Administration, the National Assembly, media, etc. In fact, foreign influence and potential economic impact of trade played a triggering role to bring environmental issues into forefront in the early 90s in Korea.

     The media disseminated environmental information and raised awareness: Without the key role of the media, the environmental vision could have not been a reality in Korea. The media disseminated information not only of the state of the environment in Korea and around the world but also of important scientific findings and analyses and developments in the international community. In fact, the media was the prime forum for the enlightening movement in Korea.

     In some cases, vision might need to be enlightened by leadership: This vision making process as described here is not necessarily a good example. However, it deserves some attention in that we can learn how a society lacked an environmental foresight became enlightened through a collective leadership while responding to external influences.

Peer Review Committee Good practice rating: (1 for the best, 5 for the lowest score)
Sustainability		Efficiency
3	Improvement in either the environment of economic condition with no harm to the other.	-	Cost efficient.
2	Sustainable over time (not one-off)	Process
Adaptability		-	Participation of the community
3	Location adaptability (can the project be done in other places?)	2	Participation of resource owners/users
3	Socio-cultural adaptability.	2	Partnerships between various actors (Governments, NGO, Academia, Private)
3	Level of development adaptability.	-	Degree of coordination and cooperation between government departments.
2	Style of government adaptability.	2	Ability to attract political interest/support
3	Degree of decentralization adaptability.	-	Procedures for feedback and review.
Comments on this example:      It is not always necessary for the government to be the initiator of all policies or action plans. This example proves how powerful the media and external forces could be in promoting environmental awareness to the society. With people and private sectors demanding for environmental improvement themselves, the government will surely receive much cooperation and support to from various sectors when implementing environmental action plans. Sustainability of the project:      Awareness and visions: It can be realized from this example that it is not always the case that the government would be the main institution generating awareness and setting visions on environment and that it can be any other institution that has enough power to get through to the public. Hence, vision does not necessarily be top-down, but it could also be bottom-up.      Improvement in either the environment or economic condition with no harm to the other: It is difficult to determine whether an environmental vision would create positive changes to either environment or economic or both, without harming the other, until the vision has been put into an enforced policy or action plan. But at the initial stage where visions have only been established, no changes in the environment or economic would have possibly occurred. Therefore, rating for improvement in either economic or environmental condition, is low.      Ability to attract political interest/support: The media in Korea was certainly successful in raising public awareness on environment and has also received public interest and support because the public, after being correctly informed, want to act in a way that will not harm, but instead, improve the environmental condition. Adaptability of the project to other situations:       Process of decision making and implementation:      International commitments: International demands have urged many countries to set up their own national environmental vision so that they will have a guideline towards sustainability. Cost efficiency: