2 - Explaining the South Korean “miracle”

Summary

This chapter is concerned with explaining the basis and structure, in other words, the genesis, of what has frequently been coined “Korea Inc.”. Although the focus of our analysis is certainly on the postcolonial period, we would be remiss to not acknowledge the roughly 40-year period of near complete dominance of the peninsula by Japan. This discussion, even after more than 75 years after the end of Japanese colonialism, continues to be undeniably controversial, with the majority of those engaging the Korean miracle typically avoiding altogether this uncomfortable, potentially anti-nationalist narrative. This section, while brief, discusses some of the key arguments about this period, while acknowledging the methodological difficulty of robustly linking the colonial period to the economic take-off in the 1960s.

COLONIAL AND CULTURAL LEGACIES DEBATED

As noted earlier in this text, scholars of Korean history typically trace this country’s roots back to ancient Joseon (Gojoseon) (c. 2333–108 BCE). Despite the much earlier origins of what would become Korea, most scholars point to the Goryeo dynasty (918–1392) as the key point in Korea’s modern emergence as a rationalized state. The Goryeo period was then replaced by the Joseon dynasty (1392–1910), which governed the peninsula until it began to slowly erode as principally a result of corruption and inefficiency (see Cumings 1997). The Joseon dynasty’s descent coincided with Japan’s emergence as a major regional power, thus setting the stage for the colonial period in which Japan replaced Korean-domestic rule by fully annexing it in 1910 and then governing the entirety of the peninsula until its defeat at the end of the Second World War in 1945.

By the time Korea had been annexed, Japan itself was immersed in its own decades-long efforts against its potential colonization by foreign powers, which had in large part precipitated the end of the Tokugawa period (1603–1868) and advent of the Meiji era (1868–1912), in which its traditional government and economy was replaced by a more modern, Western-influenced one, with the goal and ultimate realization of rapid industrialization.