Producing Bukhansan as an Operational Landscape of Metropolitan Seoul : Developmentalist Urbanization and the Urban Political Ecology of Urban Nature Parks, Greenbelts, and National Parks, 1960s–1980s

Amid the developmentalist urbanization of the 1960s to 1980s, Bukhansan—located on the outskirts of Seoul—was incorporated into multi-scalar spatial strategies formulated through the Urban Planning Act, the Natural Parks Act, and the Capital Region Readjustment Planning Act. Through the Seoul Metropolitan Government’s “Grand Park” initiative, its designation as a Green Belt (1971), and its designation as a national park (1983), Bukhansan was produced as an operational landscape of the capital. The Ministry of Construction’s 1983 designation aimed to prepare for mega-events such as the 1986 Asian Games and the 1988 Seoul Olympics, transforming Bukhansan into a tourism and leisure asset within the urban economy. This article demonstrates how the state strategically configured urban nature as “state–nature,” juxtaposing governance and development. It further reveals how planetary urbanization unfolds by formally maintaining the urban–nonurban boundary while functionally integrating nonurban spaces into the urban system.