Chaebol played a key role in developing new industries, markets, and export production, helping make South Korea one of the Four Asian Tigers. Although South Korea's major industrial programs did not begin until the early 1960s, the origins of the country's entrepreneurial elite were found in the political economy of the 1950s. Very few Koreans had owned or managed larger corporations during the Japanese colonial period. After the departure of the Japanese in 1945, some Korean businessmen obtained the assets of some of the Japanese firms, a number of which grew into the chaebol of the 1990s. The companies, as well
Chaebol debt and are less vulnerable to similar crises, as was demonstrated in the 2008 crisis. With the growth of the fewer remaining chaebols however, each now occupies a larger portion of the economy. The protectionist policies and preferable government treatment granted the chaebol the ability to exhibit monopolistic behavior. The absence of a market free of intervention meant that "true competition" became a rarity in South Korea. Especially in the era prior to the IMF crisis, the only products available to the Korean people were those made by the chaebol. Therefore, the social fabric of the country lacked an entrepreneurship