Court rules against order to revise textbook

By Bae Ji-sook

The Seoul Administrative Court ruled Thursday that the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology should withdraw its order for textbook maker Kumsung Publishing to revise the content of high school textbooks.

The ruling was made upon requests from three of the authors of the “modern Korean history” textbook who claimed that the direction by the authorities has violated their authorial rights.

In November 2008, the education ministry “recommended” Kumsung to revise several parts of the “problematic” books, which they referred to as “leftist-leaning.” While the writers resisted, the publisher, who feared losing the government’s authorization, rephrased the parts at issue and published it without the authors’ consent.

Currently, history books are written with few governmental guidelines and are later authorized by the ministry for distribution in school classrooms.

Prof. Kim Han-jong of Korea National University of Education and two other authors claimed that the government’s intervention was a pre-screening of academic documents and violates the rights of scholars to study in a free environment.

In August, the Seoul High Court ruled in favor of Kumsung saying the deletion was not a violation of authorial rights. The judges deemed, “All Kumsung did was follow the orders of the authorities. We don’t find it in violation of anyone’s rights.”