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South Korea transformed from the poorest nation to the richest not because of the trope that education was largely responsible and I don't discount that but it'

South Korea transformed from the poorest nation to the richest not because of the trope that education was largely responsible and I don't discount that but it's far fetched to suggest that as a single cause. After all, without Park Chung Hee's military dictatorship, without essentially enslaving 1/2 of the population as a glorified slave with the threat of violence, without handing over the destiny of millions of Koreans to the hands of the dozen family run corporate dynasties (aka chaebols), without the massacre and denial of reparations and the censure, capture, torture and killing of dissidents, South Korea would not be as successful as it is. Life in South Korea during the military dictatorship which lasted 2.5 generations, was just as hard if not oppressive like the North. If you read about the Gwangju Massacre (Korea's Tianmen Square), it's pretty clear that South Korea was virtually no different than North Korea in terms of political freedom. This is the miracle of the Asian tigers - when you don't have natural commodity, the people become that commodity, expendable, something to be taken advantage of by people with capital.

tatrajim 8y ago
May I polititely suggest that your assertion of equivalence between South Korea and North Korea in terms of political freedom during the Park and Chun years is overwrought nonsense. Just ask any South Korean who lived through this period or any American peace corps volunteer like me who lived in the countryside (near Gwangju in fact) in the 1970s under the Park regime and who studied in graduate school in Seoul under the Chun regime in the 1980s. The issues are complex and require long, nuanced elaboration, but in crude terms Park was all but a fascist in name during his dictatorship and Chun was largely a loutish thug. Park is remembered surprisingly fondly by his generation, while Chun is reviled. And it is true that political dissidents were brutally treated by both Park and Chun and that the 1980 Gwangju Massacre was a horrible incident for which Chun later went to prison. However, North Korea was much worse in its control, e.g. over all religious groups and intellectuals. If you had a bad class background ("seongbun") you had nil chance for any higher education or social advancement. And with the growing cult of personality of Kim Il Sung from the mid-1960s, virtually no one could hope to express openly any thoughts critical of Kim or the Worker's Party official party line. In sum, life in the south under Park was by turns comic and tiring (the whole nation was forced to arise at 6 am every day!) and under Chun disspiriting and at the margin dangerous, but in the north under Kim, little or no freedom of personal expression existed even between spouses. Just check out the personal accounts of those who lived through it.
- progressiveweb 8y ago
  I don't think it's fair to take anecdotes from American peace corp which was known to be by large, a front to promote American interests in foreign countries. PCH and CDH wouldn't be where they are if the American government didn't recognize them as a legitimate force. PCH's head of intelligence, ultimately tried unsuccessfully to pull off a coup, panicked when Americans ignored him and spun it as a patriotic martyr who "shot the dictator", to save face. Why else would KJG try to contact American embassy repeatedly? It wasn't to run, after all he wouldn't have ordered his bodyguards to kill those who weren't in the know. It has all the sign of a coup. I am not saying life in the late 60s and throughout 70s was equally oppressive on the full spectrum of society but it was nevertheless rigid, militant and thugs were used to suppress worker's union and human rights activists. You don't hear about the thousands of families who had suffered under Park and Chun, instead you only hear about the nominal GDP. If North Korea had the Kim family, South Korea had Republic of Korea, the country itself became an idolized almost humanized symbol of the state it was in-war torn, politically unstable, national security under constant threat and skirmishes from a nearby enemy. When you force people to stop and sing the national anthem everyday and arrest people for failing to comply, when you attempt to torture and assassinate political rivals (former president KDJ), when you enforce martial law and national curfew, when you dictate the consciousness of millions through a government run media, how is that not any different from the massive cult that North has built up? A cult built up on jingoism, the ends justify the means sort of approach, sure one could argue the sacrifice of that generation was necessary but for who's benefit? Ultimately, the profits and power only grew and consolidated under the handful of men and women who simply happened to be in a position to work with the government's generous credit loans to build the empire they dreamed of. Koreans today are not happy, students are killing themselves more than any other region, people don't want to raise kids, instead grow old like Japan. My father was a journalist for a then military dictatorship run media outlet. He saw firsthand and told me stories of how the system worked and how it permeated through out the entire social hierarchy with impunity, no checks or balances, just pure straight up brainwashing. The miracle of the Han river is red with the tears, sweat and blood of our forefathers who imagined a different type of Korea, one that isn't a glorified feudalism with smartphones that spy on the citizens, a military aiming their guns at the citizens, while the Samsung and the Hyundais happily go through generation after generation of brainwashed citizens who are reaching for that elusive "Korean Dream" through a institutionalized natural selection process that preaches neo-confucian values when in reality, it's a thin veil for the otherwise corrupt social hierarchy that dictates a person's age and seniority plays more importance then merit, competence and transparency. The woke Koreans are the ones who are desperately trying to leave a country covered in fine dust pollution, where kids no longer play outside without a industrial mask, while the chaebol's offsprings are partying it up in prestigious American institutions in pristine clean neighborhoods. This is the glorious post-ww2 Japanese model in which PCH has adhered to, with hopes of becoming an economic and a military power that is supposed to provide a roof over the citizens head that weathers through storms, instead it has largely become a state which coerced its citizens into working in squalor conditions to meet the material demands of the West with cheap labor. "A perfect slave is the one who thinks he is free" couldn't be more true in South Korea.
dba7dba 8y ago
people become that commodity, expendable, something to be taken advantage of by people with capital. Around where I am, I see plenty of western corporations doing above, even with plenty of natural commodity to extract from. And no, you simply cannot compare Park Chung Hee with Kim of North Korea to be equally dictatorial/brutal/etc. You simply lose all credibility when you make that assertion, while discussing Korean affairs. Education was the single most important factor for S. Korea. And successful introduction of market based economy too, how ever troublesome it was. But without educated, competent workforce, nothing will work. Also, you stated that S. Korea's wealth improved due to enslaving half of the population, and chaebols being given control over affairs in S. Korea. What about N. Korea? N. Korea enslaved the entire population, with complete control that the chaebols of S. Korea can only dream about. And look where N. Korea is now. Practically a beggar state.

tatrajim 8y ago

May I polititely suggest that your assertion of equivalence between South Korea and North Korea in terms of political freedom during the Park and Chun years is overwrought nonsense. Just ask any South Korean who lived through this period or any American peace corps volunteer like me who lived in the countryside (near Gwangju in fact) in the 1970s under the Park regime and who studied in graduate school in Seoul under the Chun regime in the 1980s. The issues are complex and require long, nuanced elaboration, but in crude terms Park was all but a fascist in name during his dictatorship and Chun was largely a loutish thug. Park is remembered surprisingly fondly by his generation, while Chun is reviled. And it is true that political dissidents were brutally treated by both Park and Chun and that the 1980 Gwangju Massacre was a horrible incident for which Chun later went to prison. However, North Korea was much worse in its control, e.g. over all religious groups and intellectuals. If you had a bad class background ("seongbun") you had nil chance for any higher education or social advancement. And with the growing cult of personality of Kim Il Sung from the mid-1960s, virtually no one could hope to express openly any thoughts critical of Kim or the Worker's Party official party line. In sum, life in the south under Park was by turns comic and tiring (the whole nation was forced to arise at 6 am every day!) and under Chun disspiriting and at the margin dangerous, but in the north under Kim, little or no freedom of personal expression existed even between spouses. Just check out the personal accounts of those who lived through it.

progressiveweb 8y ago
I don't think it's fair to take anecdotes from American peace corp which was known to be by large, a front to promote American interests in foreign countries. PCH and CDH wouldn't be where they are if the American government didn't recognize them as a legitimate force. PCH's head of intelligence, ultimately tried unsuccessfully to pull off a coup, panicked when Americans ignored him and spun it as a patriotic martyr who "shot the dictator", to save face. Why else would KJG try to contact American embassy repeatedly? It wasn't to run, after all he wouldn't have ordered his bodyguards to kill those who weren't in the know. It has all the sign of a coup. I am not saying life in the late 60s and throughout 70s was equally oppressive on the full spectrum of society but it was nevertheless rigid, militant and thugs were used to suppress worker's union and human rights activists. You don't hear about the thousands of families who had suffered under Park and Chun, instead you only hear about the nominal GDP. If North Korea had the Kim family, South Korea had Republic of Korea, the country itself became an idolized almost humanized symbol of the state it was in-war torn, politically unstable, national security under constant threat and skirmishes from a nearby enemy. When you force people to stop and sing the national anthem everyday and arrest people for failing to comply, when you attempt to torture and assassinate political rivals (former president KDJ), when you enforce martial law and national curfew, when you dictate the consciousness of millions through a government run media, how is that not any different from the massive cult that North has built up? A cult built up on jingoism, the ends justify the means sort of approach, sure one could argue the sacrifice of that generation was necessary but for who's benefit? Ultimately, the profits and power only grew and consolidated under the handful of men and women who simply happened to be in a position to work with the government's generous credit loans to build the empire they dreamed of. Koreans today are not happy, students are killing themselves more than any other region, people don't want to raise kids, instead grow old like Japan. My father was a journalist for a then military dictatorship run media outlet. He saw firsthand and told me stories of how the system worked and how it permeated through out the entire social hierarchy with impunity, no checks or balances, just pure straight up brainwashing. The miracle of the Han river is red with the tears, sweat and blood of our forefathers who imagined a different type of Korea, one that isn't a glorified feudalism with smartphones that spy on the citizens, a military aiming their guns at the citizens, while the Samsung and the Hyundais happily go through generation after generation of brainwashed citizens who are reaching for that elusive "Korean Dream" through a institutionalized natural selection process that preaches neo-confucian values when in reality, it's a thin veil for the otherwise corrupt social hierarchy that dictates a person's age and seniority plays more importance then merit, competence and transparency. The woke Koreans are the ones who are desperately trying to leave a country covered in fine dust pollution, where kids no longer play outside without a industrial mask, while the chaebol's offsprings are partying it up in prestigious American institutions in pristine clean neighborhoods. This is the glorious post-ww2 Japanese model in which PCH has adhered to, with hopes of becoming an economic and a military power that is supposed to provide a roof over the citizens head that weathers through storms, instead it has largely become a state which coerced its citizens into working in squalor conditions to meet the material demands of the West with cheap labor. "A perfect slave is the one who thinks he is free" couldn't be more true in South Korea.

dba7dba 8y ago

people become that commodity, expendable, something to be taken advantage of by people with capital. Around where I am, I see plenty of western corporations doing above, even with plenty of natural commodity to extract from. And no, you simply cannot compare Park Chung Hee with Kim of North Korea to be equally dictatorial/brutal/etc. You simply lose all credibility when you make that assertion, while discussing Korean affairs. Education was the single most important factor for S. Korea. And successful introduction of market based economy too, how ever troublesome it was. But without educated, competent workforce, nothing will work. Also, you stated that S. Korea's wealth improved due to enslaving half of the population, and chaebols being given control over affairs in S. Korea. What about N. Korea? N. Korea enslaved the entire population, with complete control that the chaebols of S. Korea can only dream about. And look where N. Korea is now. Practically a beggar state.