kotaji 거타지

Woohoo! I made the news. Or rather I should say that Vladimir Tikhonov and I have made the news with our new translation of the writings of Han Yongun. Available in all good bookshops etc etc.

Not sure about the accuracy of this bit though:

이번 번역은 박노자 오슬로 국립대학 한국학 교수와 영국 런던대 산하 동양ㆍ아프리카학대학(SOAS)에서 박사과정 중인 오웬 밀러씨의 공동 작업으로 진행됐다.

:(

Could this be some sort of terrible omen concerning the impending handover of power?

Seoul’s oldest wooden structure is no more.

There is an excellent analysis article on North Korea in this week’s Socialist Worker. Written by Kim Ha-young and translated (slightly woodenly I must admit) by yours truly. Here she is on North Korea’s embryonic neoliberal tendencies:

Food shortages and infant malnutrition continue. Young South Koreans are as much as 15 centimetres taller than their counterparts in the North. The lives of ordinary people have got even worse since the North Korean government “reformed the state economy according to profit-making criteria” in July 2002.

Services formerly supplied free of charge now have to be paid for, subsidies for education and childcare have been abolished, and piece rates have been introduced in all workplaces.

While wages increased to between eight and 20 times their former level, workers have suffered greatly, particularly in the cities, as soaring inflation has seen rice prices increase to more than 500 times their former level.

Although it is often claimed that North Korea has refused to open up, this is not true. The North has wanted to pursue friendly relations with the US and Japan. It has also been keen to join the World Trade Organisation and the Asian Development Bank.

It was reported that Kim Il Sung’s son and successor Kim Jong-il told Japanese prime minister Junichiro Koizumi in 2002 that he wanted “to sing and dance with Bush until I go hoarse”. North Korea has even said that it would not object to US soldiers remaining on the Korean peninsula.

The final part of my look back over British newspaper coverage of the June Struggle. I think on balance I was more impressed with David Watts’ coverage in the Times than Jasper Becker’s in the Guardian. Watts managed to convey more of a keen sense of the action on the ground and his understanding of Korean society seems good too. I really wonder whether there would be coverage of this quality in the British papers if these events were happening now. Journalism has changed quite a lot in the last 20 years and in the UK international coverage seems to have been hollowed out in particular. I haven’t done an exhaustive search, but as far as I can see there has been nothing in either the Times or the Guardian to mark the anniversary. Which is somewhat surprising when you consider that back in 1987 the story was big enough for the papers to cover it almost every day and to devote a number of leaders to it.

Below are three articles from the last day of June 1987 - another excellent piece from David Watts, this time reporting from Kwangju; a leader from the Guardian; and finally an in-depth article from Jasper Becker on the ‘two Kims’.

Grassroots bitterness that choked Chun regime
From David Watts in Kwangju
The Times, June 30 1987, Tuesday

The rice fields around Kwangju have turned a rich green with the new crop and the stolid houses contribute to an air of well-being. But beneath the surface is an unrest felt as deeply as in the big cities of South Korea.

In no small measure it led to Sunday’s extraordinary statement from the South Korean Government that it had decided to cede to opposition demands for political change.

The Government decision springs from a complex of pressures.

Perhaps among the most important but less easily quantified elements were American pressure for change and the bad worldwide media image being built up which could easily have damaged the country’s chances of staging the Olympic Games.

The loss of the Olympics would have been such a blow to national pride, international prestige and the never-ending contest with North Korea, that it would have taken years to recover.

In the countryside the juxtaposition of apparent wealth and dissatisfaction confirms the notion that it takes more than an annual growth in gross national product - already in double figures - to satisfy a people so industrious and politically sophisticated that they have built their country into an economic power that threatens Japan in some sectors.

Kwangju has been a centre of opposition to the Government of President Chun Doo Hwan since some of his best troops gunned down hundreds of their fellow Koreans so that he and his fellow generals could stay in power.

That has never been forgotten, but in the countryside it was the day-to-day methods used to maintain the influence of the Democratic Justice Party that rankled.

The farmers of a small township about 40 miles into rice country warn that there must be nothing to identify them or the place as we talk over Ginseng Tea in a small tea shop.

Most farmers cannot subsist on their rice crop alone so they grow strawberries and corn for the big cities. For those with small plots, who make up about 50 per cent of the community, there are difficulties getting loans if they are not supporters of the Government. And that is important with many of the locals heavily in debt and struggling just to educate their children.

‘We see people from the ruling party living better than others so we want a change .. If you have a relative working with the Government and you support the opposition he’ll get a visit from an official warning him that he’ll lose his job if you don’t stop supporting them. ‘

Support for student demonstrators has been strong and often the students help their farming families with money from part-time jobs. In recent times three students from the area have been arrested for anti-Government activities. A young girl who served a year in jail for anti-Government activities came out to find that she could get no work at all because her identity as a criminal had been circulated. She is now reduced to shuttling between friends in Seoul and Kwangju while the Government watches her for evidence of further malfeasance.
(more…)

The final government cave-in came right at the end of the month. As I mentioned before, the role of ‘the provinces’ is interesting here. It seems from David Watts’ report in the Times that the unrest in provincial cities, and Kwangju in particular, was decisive in focusing the mind of Chun and his supporters. Seven years after the brutal events of May 1980, rather than a cowed, submissive city, Kwangju was once again in the frontline of the struggle against the dictatorship.

Chun’s party says it will seek free direct elections: Opposition in South Korea wins important concessions from a position of strength
From David Watts
The Times, June 29 1987, Monday

Forced on to the defensive by serious unrest in the provinces, the ruling Democratic Justice Party (DJP) of President Chun Doo Hwan announced concessions to the opposition early today in which they promised the free presidential elections demanded by the opposition.

The DJP will also urge President Chun to allow an amnesty for the leading dissident, Mr Kim Dae Jung, and the immediate release of most political prisoners.

Though clashes in the capital during Friday’s peace march were serious enough, it became clear later that government forces had been unable to control parts of the southern city of Kwangju. Disturbances in other areas were also serious.

The Government claimed a victory in Seoul, the capital, with massive policing and heavy tear-gas barrages, but the National Council of Churches said that more than a million people took to the streets across the country.

The police, however, claimed that fewer than 60,000 people took part in 37 cities and counties. There were 3,467 detentions, but a generally lower level of violence with protesters trying not to give the Government any pretext for stronger measures.
(more…)

Pitched battles returned to the streets of Seoul on June 26th as the students and opposition rejected the somewhat vague peace offerings of Chun Doo-hwan over the previous days. Jasper Becker describes the scenes on the streets of Seoul while The Times gives us the lowdown on South Korea’s super tear gas, apparently “a formidable cocktail of 12 secret ingredients” (sounds a bit like KFC).

Battle for Seoul at new pitch: Opposition calls for ‘democracy now’ as Chun muzzles its leaders
From Jasper Becker
The Guardian, June 27, 1987

Seoul yesterday became a battlefleld between tens of thousands of demonstrators wreathed in clouds of tear-gas and massed ranks of riot police as the Democracy Movement returned to the streets after the failure of peace talks here earlier this week.

The demonstrators, calling for ‘democracy now,’ were responding to the call of Mr Kim Young Sam, leader of the main opposition party, to wage ‘an all-out campaign to meet the people’s demands. ‘

But 10 minutes after Mr Kim appeared outside his party headquarters, preparing to march behind a large South Korean flag towards City Hall, he was roughly manhandled into a waiting police van. Police drove him to the airport, where he was later released.

With considerable brusqueness, President Chun Doo Hwan ordered the return to house arrest of the other main opposition leader, Mr Kim Dae Jung, less than two days after it had been lifted.

After a week of calm the demonstrations were probably the largest this year but less violent than those of June 10, when the present wave of unrest began.

Anarchy reigned in sections of the capital as traffic stopped in front of students hurling rocks and firebombs amid exploding teargas canisters. Bus drivers blew their horns in support of the students, while passengers raised clenched fists and leaned out of windows, chanting Pukche [Tokchae?] Tado (down with the military dictatorship).
(more…)

The Guardian reports on the release of Kim Dae Jung from house arrest, while the Times takes its turn to offer a leader on the democracy struggle in South Korea. Compare and contrast with the Guardian’s leader from a few days before.

The other noteworthy sentence is this, which doesn’t really require much comment from me: “Nor are the Americans likely to replace their client [!] quite as summarily as they did in the Philippines.”

Chun frees opponent from house arrest
From Jasper Becker
The Guardian, June 25, 1987

The South Korean government lifted the house arrest of its most feared opponent, Kim Dae Jung late last night, after an unprecedented meeting between President Chun Doo Wan and Mr Kim Young Sam, the leader of the main opposition.

Six hundred police surrounding Mr Kim’s house since mid-April withdrew at midnight, and over 500 of his supporters rushed in to celebrate the victory.

Mr Kim Dae Jung, a former presidential candidate and a charismatic figure, was immediately placed under house arrest when the present crisis began.

In 1980, he was sentenced to death for inciting students to rise against the government. This was commuted to a 20-year suspended sentence, which has allowed the government to impose house arrest over 50 times since he returned from the United States in 1985.

Earlier in the evening, Mr Gaston Sigur, a top US official on a trouble-shooting mission from President Reagan, visited Mr Kim Dae Jung after holding talks with President Chun. No details of either meeting have been released, but Mr Sigur, who is under-secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, is urging both sides to make compromises.

President Chun did not, however, agree to restore Mr Kim Dae Jung’s civil rights during his meeting with Mr Kim Young Sam.
(more…)

Monday June 22 was the day that Chun’s grip on power began to crumble as he realised that he would have to make some concessions. Such an important event was this that the Guardian actually devoted one of its leading articles to the issue on Tuesday. In the Times, David Watts gave an overview of the developing political situation, including a short phone interview with Kim Dae Jung, then under house arrest.

Leading Article: Chun can’t turn the tide
The Guardian, June 23, 1987

Nearly two weeks of mass demonstrations in the streets and universities of South Korea have obliged President Chun Doo Hwan to meet the first demand of his opposition. He is to have direct talks this week with one of the divided opposition’s leaders, Kim Young Sam, and the agenda has on it much of what Kim wants to talk about.

Some fairly outspoken comment from the United States has clearly been needed to bring President Chun to this position, and a State Department emissary is due in Seoul today, no doubt bearing in his attache case a potted history of the Philippines. The analogy is inevitable but, as usual in comparing one country with another, misleading. The Philippines had been an economic failure. South Korea has been an outstanding success. Marcos was autocratic, corrupt and friendless; Chun can be fairly accused only on the first count. Even then he can plead in mitigation that he was trying to arrange the first transfer of power since the republic was founded in 1948 which did not involve a coup or an assassination. He misjudged, though, the political temper of the country which he and his autocratic forerunners have done so much to advance economically. It wants free elections to the presidency, not a collegiate system which can be rigged to perpetuate the power, however well-intentioned, of a dynasty of self-perpetuating generals.

The idea of staging next year’s Olympics at Seoul was, from South Korea’s viewpoint, to demonstrate that the country had served its time in the development chrysalis and was now fully winged to take flight with other democratic nations. If President Chun, General Roh, and the two Kims can so arrange an overhaul of the constitution and a relaxation of press censorship that the country does emerge as intended by next year, then the rejoicing will not be confined to the Games community. The South Koreans have already won the gold for their prodigies of development. Its people look for at least a bronze in democracy.

Just as the changes now being demanded fall far short of revolution, so the government which has been so strenuously opposing them is not a stereotype dictatorship. It lives in constant anxiety about how its unlovely neighbour to the North may profit from any reforms, and so is over-inclined to look upon demonstrators as unwitting, even witting, pawns of Kim Il Sung. It must indeed be hard in Seoul to see events to which the government is necessarily central in the required perspective. South Korea has won all the attributes of a self-confident economy. Why can it not be allowed to show that self-confidence in political and social matters? It is not only college radicals who ask the question but the sober-sided middle classes who have seen a century of change in a couple of decades. Some suspect that President Chun’s strategy is to prolong the constitutional process and thus detach the professionals and the managers from the students. It is almost certainly too late in the day for such a hope to succeed. He may complain that the opposition does not have a coherent programme whereas he does. But the opposition is not a wild-cat body seeking to undo South Korea’s achievements. Repeat: this is not (or not yet) an incipient revolution, but it is a serious and unstoppable demand for reform.
(more…)

More on the US angle, this time from Jasper Becker and Mark Tram in the Guardian. What’s interesting to me about reading these reports of the rioting from the height of the struggle is how much of the actual violent action was taking place outside of Seoul. I think it’s a cautionary lesson for historians who might have a natural tendency to concentrate on what happened in the capital. It’s quite possible that the real decisive action was happening elsewhere. Another interesting element is the widespread nature of the protests - every major city was affected and reading these reports there is no sense of the ‘regionalism’ that become such a feature of Korean politics in the 1990s. Outside of Seoul, both the Cholla (Kwangju) and Kyongsang (Pusan) seem to have lead the way.

US tells Seoul not to impose martial law
From Mark Tram and Jasper Becker
The Guardian, June 22, 1987

The US State Department’s top official for Asian affairs, Dr Gaston Sigur, yesterday warned the Seoul Government against declaring martial law in South Korea. The warning came as the ruling party in Seoul hammered out a package of concessions which it hoped would mollify the opposition.

Dr Sigur spoke from Sydney, on his way to Seoul. He said: ‘We do not want to see the military involved. Martial law is not the proper approach. ‘

In public statements the US administration has urged the Seoul Government to reopen a dialogue with the opposition on moving the country towards democracy - a message Dr Sigur underlined again yesterday.

The ruling Democratic Justice Party (DJP) chairman, Mr Roh Tae Woo, is due today to try to persuade President Chun Doo Hwan to agree to the package of concessions at a meeting at the presidential Blue House.
(more…)

June 20 1987 was a Saturday and the UK papers seem to have suddenly turned their attention to the serious matter of… the Olympics, with both the Times and the Guardian producing articles with a focus on the possible consequences for the 88 Seoul games. Instead of those, here’s David Watts’ feature piece touching on everything from the Catholic Church, to the education system to the monarchy of the ‘Yi Dynasty’. Watts seems to have developed something of a strange obsession with the Korean middle class, which he claims makes up 78 percent of the population - although this seems to be a statistical impossibility to me. In true British fashion he also manages to bring up that old canard of the Magna Carta in his explanation of the Korean desire for democracy.

Firebomb path to Seoul’s Olympic flame: Mass opposition to South Korea’s generals
David Watts
The Times, June 20 1987, Saturday

The South Korean government stands virtually paralysed after more than a week of student riots in which police have been pelted with stones and firebombs.

Student protects are an almost daily feature of life in South Korea but this time they are different. The violence demonstrates a frustration with President Chun Doo Hwan’s government that leaves scarcely any sector of society untouched. The Korean word for it is han, accumulated frustration, and for many Koreans it has been building up since 1961, when the late Park Chung Hee, then head of the ruling military junta, told his people that democracy would follow a brief period of strong central government.

The opposition in the universities, in sections of the Christian church and now the middle class talks of revolution. It is the combination of the middle class and the church which could throw the country into what would be a bloody civil war if there is no response to their demands.

The middle class, to which 78 per cent of Koreans now belong, rarely curses the students for disrupting business or mouthing slogans sympathetic to North Korea. They hang out of upstairs windows to applaud or harangue the government’s hapless militia on the streets. Bus-loads of office workers returning home sing the national anthem as they pass equally packed buses full of riot police. The middle class, once guarantors of stability, are now among the government’s strongest critics. The potent political mixture President Chun now faces does not yet include many workers but the rest is more than enough to cause serious concern for the stability of his government.

Beyond the sea-change in the middle class there is a student movement now willing to moderate its public rhetoric to include political demands which it believes will broaden its support. There is a Roman Catholic Church willing to say publicly through Cardinal Stephen Kim that the government has lost its popular support.
(more…)