Issue Scenario: Isolated Innovator

Summary

The Isolated Innovator scenario combines fragmented gridlock with sovereign innovation, producing a Korea of extreme contradiction in 2045. National reform remains stuck, public education has collapsed, social safety nets are full of holes and infrastructure is ageing. Yet a few elite conglomerates and research groups achieve remarkable breakthroughs on their own, using capital and global networks inside secure smart clusters. The gains do not spread: most citizens who lose jobs to AI and automation are left in outdated systems, and wealth concentrates among a small group. The report says this path emerges when technology investment succeeds but governance reform fails, with warning signs such as rising income concentration, a falling labour share and widening gaps between large and small firms.