Trump's path to industrial sovereignty, Lee Jae-myung's embrace of global capital. Korea at an industrial crossroads. Hanmiilbo Graphics

Table of Contents

① The Invisible Hand Shaking the Stock Market

② The Industrial Dependence Structure Designed by BlackRock

③ Lee Jae-myung's Choice of Comprador Capitalism

Criticism has arisen that the economy has been ruined within 100 days of taking office. Now, it seems to be heading beyond "ruin" to an unrecoverable "total collapse."

The path chosen by the Lee Jae-myung administration is not a Trump-style industrial sovereignty strategy, but a path of entrusting economic sovereignty to global capital such as BlackRock and MSCI. This is a revival of comprador capitalism and a choice to trap Korean manufacturing in a dependence structure centered on China.

President Trump constantly confronted global capital. He used tariffs to shake up multinational corporations' low-cost outsourcing models and sought to restore national industrial autonomy through energy independence, including nuclear power.

He dismissed ESG investment, focused on wind and solar power, as "garbage" and pressured American manufacturing to return to the mainland with policies that promoted both fossil fuels and nuclear power. This was not mere rhetoric but a course of action that combined investment strategy with national strategy.

In contrast, the Lee Jae-myung administration rejected the path of industrial sovereignty, similar to Trump's. Instead, they joined hands with global capital such as BlackRock and MSCI. While this might be packaged as an achievement of "attracting foreign capital" on the surface, the actual structure is no different from pushing the Korean economy down the path of comprador capitalism.

Let's look at the actual investment amounts. For Hyundai Motor, BlackRock and Vanguard combined hold approximately $2 billion (about 2.8 trillion won). However, a completely different picture unfolds for leading Chinese electric vehicle and battery companies. BYD: approximately $9.7 billion (about 13 trillion won), NIO: approximately $2 billion (about 2.7 trillion won), XPeng: approximately $700 million (about 900 billion won). The total for these three companies is about $12.4 billion, or 16 trillion won.

In other words, the amount invested by global capital in the three Chinese electric vehicle companies is about six times the investment in Hyundai Motor. This investment bias reveals the order that global capital desires.

It is not about fostering Korea as an independent competitor, but about integrating it as a dependent variable in the Chinese manufacturing-centric supply chain. Within this order designed by capital, Korean manufacturing risks being relegated to a subcontracting structure for China, rather than developing independent competitiveness.

The recent incident where the MOU for simplifying the supply of Korean-US shipbuilding equipment was abruptly postponed just before signing is particularly significant.

The timing coincided with the Lee Jae-myung administration's major announcement of investment MOUs with BlackRock for AI and renewable energy. While the explanation on the surface was "need for further discussion," it is interpreted in reality as a signal of explicit discomfort from the Trump administration.

Trump's core strategy is to promote the revival of manufacturing and shipbuilding industries within the United States. He appears uncomfortable with Korea joining hands with global capital, which he sees as an adversary.

The path chosen by the Lee Jae-myung administration is not simply about attracting foreign capital. It is a choice to integrate Korean manufacturing into a subordinate structure within the global capital order centered on China. Trump fought against global capital, while Lee Jae-myung embraced it. The outcome is predictable: Korea's economy may lose its sovereignty and fall into an unrecoverable abyss.

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