Park Chung Hee Era

by Byung-kook Kim

  Strengthening the chaeya’s incentives for solidarity with the NDP even more, conservative Yi Ch’ôl-s¤ng backed progressive Kim Dae-jung over moderate-conservative Kim Young-sam in the opposition political party’s election of its 1971 presidential candidate on regionalist grounds. Kim Dae-jung represented a new breed in NDP factional politics. Whereas Yi

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  Ch’ôl-s¤ng boasted of his anticommunist political credentials built during his student-activist days of post-liberation Left–Right ideological struggles, and Kim Young-sam of his spirit of moderation and his centrist role in legislative politics since 1954, Kim Dae-jung had entered South Korean politics as a leftist in 1945. Until 1946 he had participated in the Committee for the Preparation of Korean Independence and the leftist People’s Committee, and worked in the New People’s Party, because, he said, he

  “did not have a clear understanding of either communism or nationalism.” Disillusioned by the pro-Soviet orientation of Korean communists, Kim Dae-jung quickly severed his ties with them and embraced the nationalist principle of “Independence First.”32 This early involvement in communist activities came to haunt Kim Dae-jung, once he acquired national political stature in 1971. Ironically, it was Park with his own brief period of participating in the leftist organization, who played on the public distrust of Kim Dae-jung’s ideology to short-circuit his political career.

  By contrast, what the Right thought was Kim Dae-jung’s political fault was an ideological plus in the eyes of many chaeya activists. Whereas Park converted to South Korea’s political conservatism, Kim Dae-jung evolved into a progressive thinker, fitting in well with the chaeya that, for the most part, were a “liberal reformist movement.”33 Its members objected to Park because he placed national security and economic growth before democracy in the hierarchy of national priorities. The chaeya embraced democracy as its top priority because “democracy was a catalyst [or a precondition] for economic development, not its obstacle,” to quote the words of Kim Dae-jung. The two were in a virtuous circle, democratization facilitating economic development and vice versa, as in Western Europe.34 Park took the opposite stand, asserting that “for developing countries, economic modernization [is] an absolute precondition for the growth of democracy . . . Democracy blossoms only on the fertile soil of economic development.”35

  On April 19, 1971, Kim Chae-jun (a minister), Ch’ôn Kwan-u (a journalist), and Yi Pyông-rin (a lawyer) became co-chairs of the National Council for the Safeguard of Democracy (NCSD). The council was the representative of the progressive wing of South Korea’s religious forces, press, intellectuals, and legal community, thus bringing the hitherto dispersed factions of the chaeya into a nationwide organization of solidarity against Park. Students, for their part, formed the National Student Alliance for the Safeguard of Democracy (NSASD), as civil society’s watchdog over the presidential election. Under the leadership of the NCSD, a total of 6,139 students, youth leaders, literati, and religious activists jointly set up local election-monitoring commissions throughout the country.36 Despite

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  Park’s electoral victory, the chaeya—unlike in 1967 and 1969—managed not to collapse and instead drew on their strengthened organizational capabilities. From March to November 1971, a total of 269 student demonstrations broke out, with 62,264 students participating.37 As their protests refused to subside, Park was forced to issue a decree on October 25 authorizing a military presence on university campuses. Armed military troops marched onto the campus of every major university in Seoul, resulting in the arrest of as many as 1,889 student activists.

  The repression backfired, triggering a proliferation of underground campus newspapers, which soon became the chaeya’s primary mechanism of disseminating radical ideas to bring about what chaeya activists called the ¤isikhwa, or the raising of the students’ consciousness to the reality of social injustice and political repression. The underground publications that came to acquire influence over the student body included Seoul National University’s Chayu-¤i Chong (The Bell of Liberty), £idan (The Righteous Platform), Hwalhwasan (The Active Volcano), Hwaetpul (The Torch), and Chônya (The Eve); Korea University’s Hanmaek (The Pulse of the Han [Korean]), Sanjisông (The Living Intellectual Spirit), and Sannara (The Nation Alive); Ewha Womans University’s Saeôl (The New Soul) and Saetpyôl (The Morning Star); Yonsei University’s Naenara (My Country); the Korean Student Christian Federation’s Kwangya-¤i Sori (The Voice of the Field); Chônnam University’s Noktu (Mung Beans, a popular alias of Chôn Pong-jun, a leader of the 1894–1895 peasant uprising against Japanese imperialism and the Chosôn dynasty’s exploitative feudalism); and Pusan University’s Hanôl (The Soul of the Han [Korean]).38 As the titles suggest, the student activists of the early 1970s not only focused on political democratization but also zeroed in on minjung issues from the rights of workers to the structure of urban poverty. Highly critical of the mainstream press for having compromised its role as the watchdog of the state, the underground newspapers, weeklies, and monthlies vigorously called on students to rise up against social injustice and political repression.

  The increasing criticism of these mainstream press had an awakening effect on journalists. On April 15, 1971, Dong-A Ilbo announced a “Declaration on Freedom of the Press” and pledged to fight censorship. Hankook Ilbo, Chosun Ilbo, JoongAng Ilbo, Munhwa Broadcasting Company, and Haptong T’ongsin (Hapdong News Agency) soon joined the cause with their own manifestos.39 On July 28, a total of 153 judges confronted the Public Prosecutor’s office with their demand for the independence of the judicial branch, the first judicial defiance of its kind since the establishment of the Republic in 1948. On August 23, a group of university professors denounced the military troops’ occupation of the campus, and

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  declared their support for the academic community’s freedom and autonomy. The chaeya thought Park was under attack on all fronts, with the press, judiciary, and academia, in addition to urban squatters and union organizers, starting to challenge him for their political and civil rights.

  Against the rising tide of opposition, Park chose to raise—not reduce—

  the level of political repression. He issued a “garrison decree” in October 1971, only to follow it with an even more drastic measure of regime change a year later. The launching of the yushin regime in October 1972

  silenced the NDP and reduced chaeya activities—but only very briefly.

  Contrary to Park’s calculations, the yushin measures not only strengthened but also radicalized the dissidents. The turn to a blatantly authoritarian form of political rule ironically gave the chaeya a clear set of radical goals and strategies. The elimination of competitive elections also provided the chaeya with an opportunity to penetrate deeply into society and shape public opinion from a position of moral and ideological strength.

  Radical Political Mobilization

  Confronting the Yushin, 1972–1974

  Reflecting the changes that had occurred in the chaeya’s composition, ideology, and organization during the 1969–1972 period, it was the Christian activists, in collaboration with student radicals, who launched the first waves of political resistance against the yushin constitution by holding an anti- yushin Namsan Easter service on April 22, 1973. The Christian-led resistance signaled serious trouble for Park, because of South Korean Christians’ intimate ties with religious forces abroad. Repression became a highly costly political option. Any arrest of Christian activists instantly triggered diplomatic protests and especially eroded support for Park in America.

  The news of the Namsan Easter service soon reached the university campuses to ignite new waves of political protest. Korea University students launched anti-Park protests in May and June 1973, only to see their leaders arrested by the police. After several months of silence, Seoul National University students held a street demonstration on October 2, calling for />
  “the termination of fascist rule by the security forces, the re-establishment of liberal democracy with basic rights of the people re-instituted, the eradication of subservience to Japan, and the construction of a nationalist economy based on the principles of national autarky and people’s right to the minimum standard of living.”40 Because of press censorship, the student protestors could not reach out to the public for support. Nonetheless, the

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  news of their resistance spread to other sectors of the chaeya, to be interpreted as a call to rise up against Park.

  Reverend Kim Chông-jun, a leading thinker on minjung theology and a dean of Hansin University, shaved his head in protest against the crackdown on student activists. Chaeya leaders like Chang Chun-ha, the editor of Sasanggye, and Paek Ki-wan began a nationwide effort to collect a million signatures for the revision of the yushin constitution on December 24, 1973. The signature drive immediately found support among the literati community, religious leaders, students, and NDP politicians, becoming a catalyst for a wide range of moderate societal leaders to merge forces with the hitherto radical-dominated chaeya movement. The infusion of moderates, from Cardinal Kim Su-hwan and Buddhist monk Pôpjông, to intellectuals like Yi H¤i-s¤ng, Paek Nak-chun, Pak Tu-jin, Yi Sang-¤n, and Kim Yun-su, to Reverend Kim Kwan-sôk and politicians Kim Hong-il and Yi In dramatically strengthened the chaeya’s standing in the eyes of the general public.41 In only eleven days, the signature drive succeeded in getting 30,000 people to sign in support of the revision of the yushin constitution.

  Park reacted by issuing Emergency Decree no. 1, which prohibited any de-nunciation of the yushin constitution. That prompted Christian leaders to issue another declaration of opposition—this time, not only against the yushin but also against Emergency Decree no. 1.

  On April 3, 1974, the police, in cooperation with the KCIA, arrested 2,000 student activists under the charge that they had clandestinely organized a subversive National Democratic Youth Students Alliance (NDYSA) at North Korea’s instigation. The same day, Park authorized Emergency Decree no. 4 in order to quell student protests. The decree prohibited student rallies and demonstrations, empowered the state to close down schools that were found to violate the decree, permitted the mobilization of the armed forces whenever necessary for the purposes of public security, and dramatically increased the legal punishment for the instigators of demonstrations to include the death sentence.42 The promulgation of Emergency Decree no. 4 occasioned the arrest of 2,000 people, 203 of whom were sentenced to imprisonment by the military court. The court verdicts added up to a total of 1,800 years, and included eight death sentences.43

  The NDYSA was a fabrication. The student activists had been planning to instigate a nationwide anti- yushin demonstration as part of their effort to forge a broad alliance of resistance among diverse student forces, but they had not organized the NDYSA. The yushin regime’s invention of NDYSA activities had the effect of strengthening the chaeya’s sense of solidarity and the expansion of its forces in society. The arrest of former presi-

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  dent Yun Po-sôn, Bishop Chi Hak-sun, Reverend Pak Hyông-gyu, poet Kim Chi-ha,44 and professors Kim Tong-gil and Kim Ch’an-guk on charges of aiding the students’ organization of NDYSA from behind the scenes made the yushin regime’s legal case seem all the more untenable in the eyes of the general public. The Christian opposition, in particular, strengthened after the April 1974 crackdown. Park’s attempt to weed out all sources of opposition on university campuses in one single stroke only provoked stronger resistance from below. With the public questioning the yushin regime’s intentions, repression became increasingly ineffective in silencing the chaeya.

  On the other hand, the “Declaration for the Minjung, Nation, and Democracy,” which the student activists announced before their arrest on April 3, 1974, showed the student movements’ radicalization since the promulgation of the yushin constitution. These activists claimed to lead a

  “nationalist democratic movement representing the will of the minjung and pursuing genuine freedom and equality.” Their agenda was a precursor to the 1980s’ radical samminju¤i (Peoples’ Three Principles) of minjungju¤i, nationalism, and democracy. Unlike the more liberal-bourgeois color of the pre- yushin student movements, the student activists of April 1974 had a clearly defined social and political agenda that included confiscating the “illicit wealth” accumulated by chaebol owner-managers and politicians, reducing taxes on the popular sector, guaranteeing minimum subsistence earnings for the masses, recognizing workers’ right to collective action through an overhaul of the labor laws, releasing all chaeya activists from prison, replacing the yushin regime with a genuinely democratic political order, dismantling the KCIA-led coercive security apparatuses, and building an “autonomous” national economic system through a decisive shift away from the exploitative export-led industrialization drive.

  The 1974 declaration also appealed for the participation of workers in company management and industrial policymaking. To show the yushin regime the power of the chaeya opposition, the declaration’s authors also called on students to gather in front of the Seoul city hall and move along to the Ch’ônggyech’ôn to show solidarity with the workers in the clothing sweatshops where Chôn T’ae-il had once worked.

  Three months after the crackdown, the yushin regime reversed itself and lifted Emergency Decree no. 4, realizing that the measure had unexpectedly strengthened the chaeya’s resolve to resist. The overture toward dialogue did not work. On the contrary, political protests broke out every day through the end of 1974. Some university students staged hunger strikes.

  Many more went to the streets to confront the police. In Kwangju, the authorities had to cancel classes at seven high schools in order to prevent

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  demonstrations. By October 30, 1974, the Ministry of Education (MoE) had to close down a total of 44 universities and issue an administrative order to 13 others among South Korea’s 77 four-year universities to stop the spread of protests. Finally, on December 25, leaders from all corners of society—opposition politicians, Catholic activists, Protestant leaders, Buddhists, journalists, professors, writers, judges, and feminist leaders—created the People’s Congress for the Restoration of Democracy (PCRD), with the goal of bringing down the yushin regime. The PCRD leadership consisted of many of South Korea’s most renowned public figures: Catholic priests Yun Hyông-jung and Ham Se-ung; lawyers Yi Pyông-rin, Hong Sông-u, and Han S¤ng-hôn; feminist leaders Yi T’ae-yông and Kim Chông-rye; opposition politicians Kim Young-sam, Kim Dae-jung, Yang Il-dong, and Kim Ch’ôl; writer Kim Chông-han; journalist Ch’ôn Kwan-u; Reverend Kang Wôn-ryong; professors Paek Nak-ch’ông and Kim Pyông-gôl; and philosopher Ham Sôk-hôn.

  Adopting self-determination, peace, and righteous conscience as its

  “principles guiding action” and the restoration of democracy as its goal, the PCRD defined its campaign of resistance as a “people’s movement.”

  For the first time in the chaeya’s history, the PCRD strove to organize political struggle in a systematic way, establishing a six-member operations committee and a secretariat at the center and “chapters” in the provincial areas. By March 1975, the PCRD had managed to establish seven chapters at the city and province level and twenty at the county level, with leadership coming mostly from the local clergy and opposition party branch.

  A month earlier, the People’s Congress had proclaimed the Democratic People’s Charter—as opposed to the yushin regime’s National Education Charter—in which the PCRD declared that “in an act of conscience . . . we hope to devote ourselves to a nationwide people’s movement for the establishment of democracy.” In a separate statement addressed to the minjung, the PCRD called for a “movement to encircle [and isolate] the dictatorial regime” in the “spirit of intransigence and disobedience.” PCRD leaders seemed to be co
nsidering launching a civil disobedience movement.

  The “People’s Coalition,” 1975–1979

  By March 1975, discontent had become so pervasive that each protest drew students by the thousands. For the first time since the promulgation of the yushin constitution, demonstrations were drawing in nonactivist students in large numbers. To preempt a further escalation of political conflict, the yushin regime reverted back to the strategy of political repression and issued Emergency Decree no. 7 on April 8, 1975. With it, the mil-

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  itary sent troops to occupy the campus of Korea University. In the month of April alone, a total of twenty-five universities were forced to cancel lectures. A Seoul National University student, Kim Sang-jin, committed suicide by disembowelment during a demonstration rally after reading a

  “Declaration of Conscience” and an “Open Letter to the President,” in which he cried out: “How can we tolerate dictatorial rule anymore? . . .