Korean regionalism

By Bernard Rowan

No country or nation can claim to be completely unified. Differences between parts of a country or nation capture diversity, situate opportunities for learning and collaboration, and reflect deeper sources of environmental, cultural, and other social heterogeneity. Despite the fact that South Korea is often viewed as a very homogenous culture, the enduring relevance of Honam vs. Yeongnam, or Korean regionalism, is a continuing source of difference. It is also a site for critical attention by those who will guide and promote the continued development of Korea as an advanced nation.

At least since the time of Park Chung-hee, and according to other experts reaching much further back in time to the Silla and Baekje Kingdoms, Koreans have divided their political allegiances along regional lines. Since the 1970s, progressive candidates have tended to fare better in the western part of South Korea (Honam), while conservatives hold sway in the east (Yeongnam). Seoul and Gyeonggi Province can at times play the part of a balancing or deciding area in terms of presidential elections. This political tendency is also evident in the outcomes of local, provincial, and national elections. Martin Lewis recently analyzed this tendency in terms of national politics for GeoCurrents.

Park Geun-hye and other national leaders of both parties must decide whether to hew to their regional safe zones or to work against the grain of typical electoral winning strategies, as candidates and as elected leaders. An important task for any victorious statesperson at the national level is to build greater national synergy by uplifting Koreans in all regions and countering sources of inter- and intra-regional inequality.

More emphasis should be placed on the study of causes of regionalism in Korea and the opportunities this aspect of South Korean political culture might hold. It certainly is the case that economic disparities exist between the regions, although some analysts say that a greater source of income disparity is the difference between Seoul and the rest of South Korea.

What no one should dispute is that income inequality overall is growing in South Korea. The gap between the rich and poor was recently discussed by Choi Won-sik and Richard Dobbs in “Renewing the South Korean Miracle,” (Korea Times, Feb. 25). The social implication of income inequality is that it tends to reinforce regional differences and regionalism in lean economic times.

Korean local autonomy also can reinforce regionalism, as the lion’s share of local offices, and in turn other kinds of posts such as professorships and contracts and business deals, favor “networks” that follow local and regional loyalties and consanguinities. Regionalism extends familism, hierarchy, and in-/out- dynamics of social and political psychology. It correlates with neo-Confucian authority and patriarchal thinking. These aspects of Korean regionalism need to be understood, deconstructed, and transcended or discarded over time.

This is because the bane of regionalism is the feeling it can inculcate of latent division tending to enmity/otherness rather than one of difference elevating a celebration of diversity or of difference elevating a concern to compete in a positive sum context. Korean regionalism is associated today with inequality, resentment and memories of authoritarianism or the Gwangju massacre, distant historical antecedents and rival paths to development that leave too many behind or nursing living memories of frustrated relative expectations.

Regionalism also disinclines South Koreans to envision unification with the North. If East-West thinking underlies and correlates with other sources of social division and inequality (age, class, gender and so forth) in South Korea, it extends a national context that will be less inclined to promote unity with those who live in the North. This will make more difficult the planning for any eventual transition in North Korea’s society and state.

However, other aspects of regionalism should be isolated for further development in a positive sense relative to the economy. The differences of climate, local environments, local products and cultural practices should be seized upon as sources of comparative advantage. More textured analyses of latent economic potential across Korea’s regions should be used as bases for place tourism, for service and manufacturing entrepreneurialism, and for national, provincial, and local economic development.

No path forward for an advanced nation is facilitated by wide gaps in outcomes and results between segments of societies, including regions of a country or nation. In this vein, all regions of the country should be provided with the needed numbers of quality schools, universities, healthcare facilities, centers for working women and the aged, public facilities, transportation, and sports and cultural sites. A good development plan would chart master plans for regional development that would reach beyond the tendencies represented by presidential and local politics.

Korean citizens should demand of each president of South Korea, each provincial governor, and local mayors and county chiefs a greater attention to Korean regionalism as a barrier to Korean unity and as an opportunity for Korean development as an advanced nation.

Bernard Rowan is director of assessment and program quality, professor of political science and coordinator of international studies at Chicago State University, where he has taught for 19 years. Rowan is a past fellow of the Korea Foundation and former visiting professor of the Graduate School of Local Autonomy, Hanyang University.