Protest Culture in South Korea

South Korea has a rich protest culture that stands in stark contrast against its twentieth-century authoritarian history. Pro-Democracy protests have endured in South Korea under all of the administrations from Rhee Seung-man to Park Geun-Hye. Most recently, the protest for the impeachment of President Park Geun-Hye included approximately 2.3 million protestors across South Korea and was “politically stabilizing by bringing public pressure to bear upon the working of democratic institutions to ensure that the checks instituted by their Constitution would successfully guard against a tyrannical president or one otherwise unfit for office” (Kim 2017: 18).

The protest culture that exists in South Korea “indicates new democratic sensibilities liberated from authoritarian preconceptions and limits that had dominated Korean politics” (Kang, 2017: 750). For example, the Candlelight Movement represents fighting a system of corruption that exploits and disregards the humanity of workers.

In Chief Kim, TQ Currier workers described horrific working conditions that led to the union holding a formal protest. TQ was consistently forcing the workers to cover more and more of their own costs which put extreme financial stress on the workers. A real life example of this type of this issue is raise of the minimum wage in May of this year. Although, the minimum wage went up in South Korea, the reality is grim as certain benefits are now included in the wage, leaving workers arguably worse off than before. As in the drama, real workers are put under increasingly greater financial stress, leading to discontentment and protests. In Chief Kim, because the TQ Curriers protest disrupted the Chinese investment deal that was currently underway, the executives at TQ were determined to shut down the protest any way possible.

This resulted in arrests of the union members and the use of physical force. Not only does this issue in the drama reflect the prevalence of South Koreans turning to protest as a means of taking control away from increasingly dominant Jaebols, it also reflects the class and wealth distribution problems intensifying in South Korea. Protests have become an ordinary citizen’s way to hold the elite accountable for their actions (Moon 2012: 872). As the division between classes, workers and conglomerates widen, the protest culture in South Korea is likely to intensify.

The creation of the internet has revolutionized communication patterns allowing for new types of interactions between the younger generation. The networks formed online by the younger generation represents a shift in the future of South Korea’s social movement tradition.

The circulation of information, interconnectedness of the country, and the online subversion of the government has begun to seep into the well established protest culture to influence real world outcomes. With the exceptionable success of contemporary protests as seen during the impeachment of Park Geun-hye, South Korea's protest culture shows no signs of weakening.

---

Questions:

1. Do you believe having a strong protest culture strengthens the voice of protestors or drowns them out due to surplus?

2. How will the internet influence protests in the future and what will be the advantages and disadvantages?

---

Citations:

Kang, Jiyeon. "Internet Activism Transforming Street Politics: South Korea’s 2008 ‘Mad Cow’ Protests and New Democratic Sensibilities." Media, Culture, and Society, (2017): 750-761.

Kim, Nan. "Candlelight and the Yellow Ribbon: Catalyzing Re-Democratitization in South Korea." The Asia-Pacific Journal 15, no. 5 (2017): 1-21.

Moon, Seungsook. "Protesting the Expansion of US Military Bases in Pyeongtaek: A Local Movement in South Korea." South Atlantic Quarterly 111, no. 4 (2012): 865-876.

(All images/screenshots were taken from Viki and no copyright or infringement intended).