Minister to be empowered to change textbook content

By Na Jeong-ju

The education ministry said Wednesday it is seeking to revise related laws to give the education minister the power to change the content of state-published school textbooks.

If the revision is approved by the National Assembly, the minister will also be empowered to directly ask private textbook publishers to revise content. The minister can take stronger punitive measures against publishers who don’t comply with such requests.

The plan is drawing criticism from liberal civic groups and educators, who claimed that publishers will be forced to reflect the government’s stance on ideologically disputed issues in textbooks.

“The ministry is trying to strengthen its control of textbook publishers. We are concerned that the measure, if implemented, will increase politically biased content in textbooks,” the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union said in a statement.

The ministry said the minister is authorized to change textbook content under the presidential decree, but this wasn’t reflected in the existing laws.

“We are seeking to revise the laws because there is a discrepancy between the presidential decree and the current laws,” a ministry spokesman said.

Under the ministry’s plan, it can cancel licenses for private textbook publishers if they don’t follow a ministry directive when updating textbooks. They will be banned from applying for a license for the following three years, and face a fine of up to 30 million won.

The Lee Myung-bak administration and liberal educators have often clashed over the former’s alleged intervention in the publication of textbooks. The education ministry recently requested that textbook publishers correct “left-leaning” expressions in textbooks, causing a backlash from educators and activists.

For instance, the government last year erased sections describing the May 18 Democratic Movement, a popular uprising against the dictatorship of former President Chun Doo-hwan in 1980, in the revised guidelines for textbooks despite opposition from liberal historians.

The ministry also decided to describe the country’s state system as a “liberal democracy” instead of just “democracy,” reflecting suggestions from conservatives. Advocates of the use of liberal democracy said the term differentiates South Korea from North Korea as the meaning of democracy has become vague, but opponents claimed the use of liberal democracy could irritate the North and jeopardize inter-Korean relations.