ed Dump Park's textbooks

Assembly needs to deter state control of history

The opposition parties have reached a much needed agreement and joined hands to deter President Park Geun-hye's plan to rewrite a single history textbook for high schools’ use starting in 2017.

The Minjoo Party of Korea (MPK) and the splinter People's Party will move toward passing a resolution that calls for abolishing the government’s scheme to replace the current system of multiple textbooks with a single textbook published by the government. The plan has come under much criticism because she is reviving a similar state textbook policy used during her late father Park Chung-hee’s presidency.

The resolution against the state monopoly of history textbooks is meaningful because it will be the first example of the post-election cooperation between the MPK and the new People’s Party. The parties should keep in mind that the people are expecting more such cooperation in the 20th Assembly. The opposition parties should also work together and produce the most workable alternatives for some urgent national issues, such as high youth unemployment and the low birthrate crisis.

With the opposition parties’ firm stance against state textbooks, they will continue to trigger confrontation in the 20th National Assembly. It is uncertain whether the resolution will have a real effect in changing the fate of the state textbooks. The government has already started the publication process. But at least it should leave a positive precedence of non-partisan cooperation, which was glaringly absent in the 19th National Assembly.

With a subservient party to President Park holding the parliamentary majority, it was impossible for the outgoing Assembly to do something about the Park administration's authoritarian policy-making, best exemplified by the state textbooks. Last week's general election resulted in sweeping changes at the National Assembly, such as the shift of power to the opposition and a three-party system for the first time in 20 years. Park's Saenuri Party has been relegated to a second rank in parliament after the MPK. Therefore, the 20th Assembly must show that it will not be as ineffective as before in holding the government in check.

The MPK and the People’s Party must pressure President Park and her party with well-crafted strategies in addition to the resolution to rethink their attempt to whitewash history.

To make their case more compelling, the opposition parties should closely monitor overseas reaction and engage in cooperation with international organizations and experts that support their anti-state textbook movement. In a statement, more than 150 foreign scholars of Korean studies expressed concern about the regression of democratic freedoms here resulting from the government’s restoration of state history textbooks. Parties should also keep hosting events to raise public awareness about the fallacies of the state textbook plan.

The way Park bulldozed through her push for state history textbooks has sparked criticism not just in Korea but in other countries. The U.S. State Department recently criticized the plan in an annual human rights report, saying that the government-authored history textbooks raised concerns about academic freedom. A few months ago, Park’s heavy-handed leadership, demonstrated by her pursuit of the textbooks, became the subject of an editorial in the New York Times at the height of the textbook row. The editorial penetrated readers with serious questions about the health of Korea’s democracy under Park’s leadership.

Politics should be left out of the parties’ efforts to rectify a situation as damaging to the nation’s democracy and education as the publication of state textbooks.