Kim has come up with some very creative and enlightening theories and terms to describe the political and social shifts in South Korea today. The first is anti-Great Power-ism. This is the notion that South Korea is angry over external control over the relationship between N. and S. Korea. The younger generations are proponents in this school of thinking because they believe they no longer have to be exploited and made victims by the U.S. As Jager also states in his article, S. Korea has finally realized that they are not beneficiaries of U.S. protection against nuclear N. Korea but rather the victims of brain-washing by power-hungry post-imperialists. While this seems a little scary to me, I do believe S. Korea has sufficient evidence to believe this as true. The U.S.'s constant military presence in S. Korea and condemnation of N. Korea shows that the American government is aggressive with their military.
Kim also explains the concept of pan-Korea nationalism. This is the formation of internal pride and alliances between N. and S. Korea against all external state actors. The forces of globalization and anti-Great Power-ism have combined to open the Koreas to new ideas and thus close them off to aggressive foreign cultures and religions.
Former Pres. and pan-Korean nationalist Roh staunchly believes that the meddling of the U.S. thwarted any hopes of N. and S. Korea reunification. The famine and war and lack of self-determination that has plagued S. Korea can all be traced back to the actions and ideas of the U.S. in the Korean and Cold Wars and thus has caused N. and S. Korea to turn inward. This changes security in the Koreas. S. Korea used to view security as defending themselves from the nuclear threat of its norther communist neighbor but now sees a threat of security from the U.S.'s external and foreign intervention. Security involves national actors and military defense against another national actor and its complementary military aggression.
This leads to a third term called Anti-Great Power-ism. Coined by Kim, this is the idea that Great Power has always threatened the Koreas and thus should be feared. From the Opium Wars when Japan started to move in on Korea to the U.S.'s involvement in the Korean War to Japan's 2005 attempt to bring a previously Korean island in the East Sea under its control, Korea's history is riddled with oppression and bullying. It makes sense that by now they are sick of it.
57.2% of Koreans saw Japan as a military threat while only 6.2% of the Japanese felt that way about South Korea.However, we need to be cautious of this notion. What it's proponents believe is that only foreign nations are capable of committing th Great-Power sins. However, they fail to recognize that internal regimes, such as dictatorships, can also commit the oppression and threats to security the "Great Powers" have in history. The danger here is that those who fall into this way of thinking may forget to check up on internal threats to security and fall into the same trap under the domestic sector.
Kim also notes that other conditions in the Koreas are ripe for reunification and this change in security and alliances. The political conditions are now more stable and the leaders of the nations are instituting programs to inspire confidence in a reunited, prosperous Korea. They are fighting the history of hatred of fear of N. Korea to a history of oppression and misuse of S. Korea as a pawn in the Great Power's evil scheme. This may prove detrimental to relations between the Koreas and everyone else but will greatly improve the feeling the two actors have towards each other.
Kim tries to see the other, sunny side for the U.S. and China He believes that the U.S. will still be able to monitor the military and government of Asia with bases in Japan and China even though a reunification of N. and S. Korea would surely push the U.S. out of S. Korea. I am a little confused on how this helps China, as Kim tried to articulate in the end. However, what I infer is that a reunited Korea helps China by taking military out of the region.
While this seems sensible, I do believe that the reunification of Korea will cause them to close off from the world. I also believe this is not necessarily a bad thing because national soverignty is important. I think the first step is giving Korea back to the Koreans and the second step is to figure out how to relate to them in the world.
Re-writing the Past/ Re-Claiming the Future: Nationalism and the Politics of Anti-Americanism in South Korea
Jager provides a stunning discovery in her article regarding the change of Korean thoughts and values. It was recently discovered that the Korean War was begun with not one, as originally thought, but two massacres. In reality, North Korea was attacked by South Korean forces and then North Korea retaliated in what became known as the Taejon Massacre. However, the only massacre left to memory is the one in which North Korea is the aggressor and "bad guy." Now with the discovery of evidence to the contrary, no one is really sure what to think.
One of the most impressive aspects of this discovery is that it's even being allowed. Years ago during and just after the Cold War, information of this nature would never have been released. It seems as though freedom of information and opinion is greatly improving it the region.
This is one reason history is being wrestled in Korea. Another is that the end of the Cold War meant North Korea no longer has its major ally, Russia. This allowed South Korea to see that North Korea was and is not a threat to their security. Rather, N. Korea was the pawn under greater communist forces that has been freed (this is the basis of Kim's anti-Great Powerism theory). This also allows S. Korea to excuse the build up of nuclear weapons by the North as simple a defensive measure against further aggression from anti-Communist nations (i.e. the U.S.). The notion of history and security in the Koreas has undergone a shift from suspicion of one another to a suspicion of all forces who have sought military presence in the region. While security is still viewed as military security against other national actors, it has transformed from anti-N. Korea to anti-America.
Another force driving a rewriting of history and future in the Koreas is the shift in generations. The people alive during and after the Korean Wars and the Cold War are being replaced by post-Cold War voices that are now speaking up. Younger South Koreans are discovering that the U.S. and other larger actors used Koreas as pawns in their conflict, effectively pinning the two groups against each other in order to divide, and thus, weaken them enough to be taken over. What was once regarded as an alliance between the U.S. and S. Korea, is now being seen as an abusive relationship with S. Korea is the masochist position. The pan-nationalists (the idea of North and South Korea united) also believe the U.S.'s aggression against N. Korea is current evidence of this notion. The idea here is that the two countries can unite under a common enemy (the U.S) and reunite to strengthen their defenses against U.S. nuclear threats. It makes sense for S. Korea who is angry that the U.S. used them and for N. Korea who is angry that Bush calls them the Axis of Evil for simply building arms as a defensive measure against what they perceive as initial aggression from the U.S.
The means in which the idea of unification has spread is through schools. The S. Korean government has developed propaganda depicting the U.S. as an enemy that used the 38th parallel to divide N. from S. Along with the recent killing of two young S. Korea girls by U.S. army tanks running them over, S. Korean pan-nationalists have a great deal of means for encouraging the people to unite against the U.S. who has and is using and killing their people for American interests. And according to the author, it's working. Elites, government officials, policymakers, middle class, and younger people have found a commonality between them unlike ever before. Rather than be divided among class and social interets, they are all anti-American and pro-reunification. Honestly, I can understand that this makes the U.S. government nervous about aggression from the Koreas. The U.S. sees a build up of anti-American sentiment and is scared S. Korea will join and strengthen N. Korea in plans to attack. However, I believe that this is a case of the chicken and the egg; no one really knows for sure anymore who started it and everyone is on the defense.
