Global Sustainable Urban Development : A study of SDG no. 11 in South Korea and Vietnam

Sammanfattning: The field of International Relations is Western-centric through its main theories, which risks undermining the development of non-Western countries. This thesis aims to implement the alternative analytical, non-Western approach of Global IR through a Comparative Case Study of South Korea and Vietnam to analyse the so-called ‘global’ Sustainable Development Goals through two research questions: How have South Korea and Vietnam managed to fulfil SDG no. 11? and How can Global IR be used to problematise the Westernised and overly universal UN measurement indicators of SDG no. 11 in South Korea and Vietnam? Conclusively, South Korea falls more in line with the Western depiction of development than Vietnam. But Global IR can be used to problematise the UN indicators by arguing historical implications to reach their Western-centric model in non-Western countries and provides indicators that consider countries individualities. This ultimately creates a more global approach, as it acknowledges differences instead of attempting to fit all countries into one specific box of sustainable urban development.