RESPONSES TO SPATIAL RIGIDITY IN URBAN TRANSFORMATION - KOREAN BUSINESS EXPERIENCE IN LOS-ANGELES

Recent patterns of growth in small firms and the increasing number of self-employed transnational migrants in various industrial sectors reflect the ways in which the contemporary restructuring process cultivates and exploits the historically developed ethnic division of labour. More importantly, this restructuring process involves severe spatial competition and dominance between ethnic (migrant) populations for jobs and housing. This paper argues that while the processes of urban change took divergent paths in terms of social and regional configurations, the responses to this change diverge between industrial sectors, the ethnic communities and locales. This paper examines the experience of Korean businesses in Los Angeles, including the sectoral shift of Korean small firms between 1975 and 1986, the labour process, and the locational and socio-cultural characteristics of Korean firms and the community centre, Koreatown.