Research on the Development Strategy of Cultural Heritage Tourism in the Korean Peninsula

There are numerous cultural heritages on the Korean Peninsula. As early as the 1940s, the governments of the Republic of Korea and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea successively worked out laws and regulations for cultural heritage protection. In the 1970s and 1980s, they strengthened the protection and excavation of historical culture and traditional national skills. After the 1990s, the government of the Republic of Korea carried out the development strategies for “culture-oriented national development” during Kim Dae-jung’s presidency. Therefore, cultural heritage tourism, as one of the cultural tourism projects with Korean characteristics, has successfully spread to the world through the Korean Wave culture. There are now 21 projects in the Republic of Korea and two in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. Among them, Ssireum (traditional wrestling) is jointly declared by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea. This paper studies the history and present situation of cultural heritage protection in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea to analyze the characteristics, types, and policies of cultural heritage tourism, which provides profitable experiences for cultural heritage tourism in Northeast Asia.