New building to offer new possibilities for Global Center

By Kim Young-jin

The Seoul Global Center’s (SGC) planned move to a more prominent location will open a wide range of possibilities in its mission to assist foreign residents, especially the growing number of those from the developing world, its director said.

Seoul City, which funds the SGC, announced the relocation last week as part of a slate of measures aimed to improve the conditions for its some 360,000 foreign residents.

“One of the biggest restrictions we’ve had is sheer space,” SGC head Alan Timblick said in an interview at the center’s current location at the Seoul Press Center. “The new building will allow us to expand what we do.”

Now under construction near Jonggak Station, the 15-story building is expected to house an immigration office, foreign chambers of commerce and cultural facilities. These add to its array of existing services ranging from pro-bono legal advice to help register for a mobile phone or getting a small business off the ground.

“It will be a great advantage to be able to come to one place and do everything,” the 66-year-old Briton said. “It’s going to be a landmark that people will be able to find easily.”

Since its establishment in 2008 ― largely in a bid to attract foreign investment ― SGC has grown steadily, now operating seven satellite centers around the city and handling some 1,000 cases daily in seven different languages.

But the composition of foreign communities is changing with the recent influx of migrant workers and “immigrant brides” from developing countries, causing the center’s focus to shift accordingly.

“The thrust of our activities used to be making Seoul more attractive in particular to businesspeople and their families. The big thrust now is towards more services for people from non-OECD countries,” Timblick said.

The center launched a team to help these groups integrate into Korean society ― which has long prided itself on its homogeneity ― providing legal consultations and language, cultural and other services.

It even reaches out to schools to teach young people the importance of diversity. Still, such residents face challenges from discrimination to labor and visa issues, and for international brides, legal issues arising from divorce. Timblick said there was no one-size-fits-all solution.

“Their problems are very often personal, so you need to have private areas to talk confidentially,” he said. “When we move, it’ll be much easier to do that and also to bring in more staff.”

While the center’s focus has shifted, Timblick stressed that services for all foreign residents would be bolstered, including those in the health and education sectors. The new building is also hoped to bring in businesses interested in targeting foreign communities.

“One issue that is always at the root of unintentional discrimination is that there have never been enough foreigners for it to make sense to say ‘this is a market of its own worth concentrating on,’ ” Timblick said.

But with the growing numbers, that may be changing. Firms have already established booths at the center to sign foreigners up for mobile phones and credit cards, and, given the higher profile of the new building, Timblick expects more to follow.

For the man who first arrived in Korea in 1977, the main challenge for the center is not to change the mindset of foreign residents but that of Koreans, in order to eradicate discrimination. In this sense, he said, public attitudes may be changing for the better.

“When people ask about (my background), if I say I’ve lived here, I belong here, I don’t get an amazed reaction anymore,” he said. “It’s becoming a lot more acceptable to see a cosmopolitan society.”