Later, at a pub in Insa-dong, Seoul, seven or eight main figures in the artist federation were having drinks. Since early this year, important cultural administration positions have been taken over by people involved in the mass culture movements, including people at the federation. Now that they were on the brink of taking over the "yolk" of culture, they had gathered to celebrate. A person in culture circles who was there said, “I am an activist as well, but there are many who criticize that appointments have been too prejudiced. It was somewhat unpleasant to see them overjoyed at taking the positions instead of thinking how they would breathe fresh life into the culture scene.”

Two days later, at the Press Center's foreign news reporters club, traditional Korean musicians burst out in sorrowful indignation. They insisted that the appointments were invalid and requested the resignation of Culture Minister Lee Chang-dong. One of them, a joint representative of the Nationwide Forum for Professors of Korean Traditional Music, Kim Jeong-su, said, “The replacement of judges in the process of judging candidates for the chairman of the performing arts group were of a certain faction, and when we heard that one had risen to be the most likely candidate, we presented our objections, but they took no account of us and pushed this decision.”

Korea is now in the middle of a cultural revolution. Since the Roh Moo-hyun administration took office, the head positions of almost all culture and arts organizations have been changed so that they are led by those with activist backgrounds. In the process, artists of mass cultural movements and existing circles are experiencing conflict as the friction becomes more intense.

It began with the appointment of Culture Minister Lee Chang-dong, who was a film director on intimate terms with the celebrities Myeong Gye-nam and Moon Seong-geun, who contributed much to Roh’s election. Then, the heads of all affiliated organizations were switched in favor of people with backgrounds in the artist federation or the National Literature Writers Association. Hyun Gi-young, chairman of the writers association, became the chairman of the Korean Culture and Arts Foundation, which supports tens of billions of won each year. Hyun then appointed Kang Hyung-cheol, another trustee of the NLWA.

Fitting into the Roh administration’s culture administration revolution, Lee Young-jin, culture policy committee chairman of the writers association, became assistant to the minister. Mass culture theorists Shim Gwang-hyun, Park In-bae and Lee Young-wook became early members of the Culture Administration Revolution Committee. Lee Young-wook was also given the position of research chairman of culture and tourism policies. Film activist Lee Hyo-in became chairman of the Visual Archive Center. Jeong Youn-ju, with roots in the Hankyoreh newspaper, became the president of KBS. It is interesting that Kim Keun is lined up next for the position of KBS president.

The only positions that were not changed yet are the culture director of the Seoul Arts Center and the chairman of the Culture and Arts Promotion Committee. But now it is not difficult to expect that those positions will be filled by people with backgrounds in mass culture movements. This situation is evaluated as the first thoroughly “consistent” exchange of authority in cultural circles for the first time since Korea’s independence from Japan.

There are many who think positively of such mass movement activists becoming heads of institutional organizations and groups. They expect that communication with the masses and attention will bring attention to reality. However, preponderate assignment of core posts and resource distribution may cause mass culture to prevail in all areas of culture.

The chief director of the Theater Association, the Sungkyunkwan University professor Jeong Jin-su, said, “This is the extreme of shameless appointments. Even if the North Korean soldiers were to take siege of South Korea, this sort of rash and audacious selection of personnel would not have been performed if they had tried to control public sentiment.”

The results of the appointments have made public officials uneasy. On Thursday, the website of an association of public workers at the Ministry of Culture under the sixth level complained about the "prejudiced personnel placement." In a posting titled "In the end as they wish," one public official wrote, “I know the domain of culture administration that we will see in the future has become definite. From now on I must stop saying the “right” thing and being disadvantaged from it. Today, this is miserable me 'stuck' in the Ministry of Culture.”