Paik Ki-wan's ideas on national minjung revolution and their significance

Abstract

This paper aims to explore Paik Ki-wan's ideas on national minjung revolution and their significance in the history of Korean social activism. First, the interrelationship between minjung and (ethno)nation as well as historical and political contexts need a thorough investigation in order to get to the core of Paik's ideas. He argues that the contradiction of Korean capitalism can be detected from a perspective of minjung only, and hence adheres to the national unification movement based on minjung-centrism. Paik's view and ideas also help to get a picture of the current contradictions of the Korean peninsula as a whole and to make an appropriate response to the crux of the problem. Notably, unlike his comparable thinker-activists of nationalism focused on minjung-centrism, Paik Ki-wan proposes ideas on national minjung revolution which is practical and coherent throughout his life. Accordingly, he can continuously join the labor movement and the social movement of the progressive parties of the 1980s-1990s in Korea with a focus on "political empowerment of minjung on its own," thereby standing as a symbol of the ongoing minjung movement. It is also notable that an independent and indigenous thinker-activist like Paik Ki-wan is rarely found in the climate of Korean academic culture where most intellectuals are pro-West. Indigenousness of Paik's ideas is undeniably connected with his non-Western locality, but more importantly derives from his emphasis on minjung and the reality of society.