We attempt to examine how the Principles of Economics Textbooks in Korea
describe the nature of capitalistic free market economy and the role of
government, evaluating any fundamental problems inherent in their
descriptions and providing some pertinent alternatives for right descriptions.
Not surprisingly, there are two main biases in textbooks with respect to the
free market economy and the function of government. First, most of Korean
Economics Textbooks provide no descriptions on the fundamental nature of the
capitalistic market economy but focus disproportionately on the price and
market mechanism. Secondly, with regard to the role of government, the
Textbooks tend to bias towards the productive function instead of protective
function and thereby corrective function for market failures. With those in
mind, we thus suggest that in explaining free market economy the Textbooks
must emphasize two fundamental pillars, private property rights and freedom
to choose, and government’s protective function. In addition, we suggest that
the free market economy and government’s role should be taught in the
historical perspective, which leads to the superiority of market economy.