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Qingdao is the “special district of Korea in China”. This study took a field survey between 2003 and 2013 and examined the process of downtown Korean enclaves being formed, growing, and becoming extinct. The study looked into the commercial spaces of the Korean enclaves in the southern districts dense with the city hall, financial institutions, and upscale apartment buildings among the representative Korean enclaves in Qingdao; first, the study divided approximately 120 establishments run by South Koreans and ethnic Korean residents in China into the category of food service, non-food service, technological service, and professional service. The ethnic Korean residents in China engaged in accommodation and brokerage like real estate, whereas South Koreans distinguished themselves in the areas of relatively high value added such as fashion and beauty. Second, the establishments were mostly in a bad management state due to the rapid rise of rents, unsystematic store contracting system, and smaller customer groups than expected. The duration of business was short within six months, and 30% went bankrupt within a year. However, there was an ongoing inflow of new self-employers until 2008. Finally, the increasingly massive size of the service category and the external growth of the Korean enclaves were directly connected to South Korea and northeastern areas where they came from. In addition, the self-employers there attracted manpower, capital and resources from their native towns, thus maintaining the management of their establishments. Large-scale service providers backed up by multinational capital entered the city in full scale due to the urban development projects between the local government and market in the second half of the 2000s, which resulted in the higher prices of land and commodities in the downtown. The cases show that the living spaces of migrants during the age of globalization cannot settle down at one place and float around the places formed by power and market.