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The zeitgeist exists, no doubt about it. An idea or behavior that seemed appropriate at one time sometimes looks gauche and unfashionable all of a sudden. Chanting "proletarian revolution" with headbands fastened, for example, may have been a good idea in the 1980s but would be taken for insanity today. Over the past two decades, the progressives have had a firm hold on public discourse in Korea, but its energy seems to be exhausted now.
Combined with the term reform, the progressives have an advantage from birth. But history testifies that not all reforms are beneficial and not all progress moves in the right direction. The evolutionary progress of Korea's progressives has not been positive all the way. Though they have seized political power, the progressives are now censured as essentially conservative, directionless and mired in infighting and evasion of responsibility. They are a long way from the general progressive spirit of internationalism and advocacy of human rights.
The conservatives are equally deficient. Korean conservatives, grown in a greenhouse protected by power, remain committed to their privilege. To overcome ossification, the New Right movement, a sort of conservatives of the plains, emerged advocating a ¡°caring¡± conservatism and the thinking man¡¯s Right. The New Right foundation committee, in a policy document called the "2008 New Right Korea Report" published a while ago, called for a frugal government, a fair trade policy that encourages competition, improvement in inducing foreign investment, and a national-interest-first foreign policy. The Hansun Foundation for Freedom and Prosperity, a group of conservative scholars, has also produced a policy paper.
What about the progressive camp? Korea's Left has displayed destructive patterns that go beyond common or garden blundering. Take for example their explanation of illegal violent protests wielding bamboo spears in downtown Seoul, an area quite devoid of bamboo forests, as "accidental." Fortunately, there are signs of change toward a new progressivism. The emergence of a forum advocating "sustainable" progressivism led to changes in the ruling camp. Rep. Kim Young-choon berated the ruling party's anachronistic Left for being weak in specific fields like the promotion of new growth engines, greater competitiveness in the world market and human rights in North Korea. Now there are efforts to transcend the errors of the past and self-reflection and the pursuit of alternatives touched off by that admonition.
President Roh Moo-hyun, by banking on his support base among the conservative Left through good use of his trump card of populism, managed to conclude a free trade agreement with the U.S. It's an achievement that would have been difficult under a conservative administration. As the staunch anti-communist Richard Nixon achieved a detente with the communist China with ease, so the Roh administration that advocates independence and progress achieved the FTA with relative ease.
Health and Welfare Minister Rhyu Si-min, who is unpopular even within the ruling party, is going in the right direction with his attempts to reform the national pension system. Breaking with progressive doctrine for the sake of future generations, they must be commended. Traditionally, progressives tend to be desperate to collect as much tax as possible and pay out to the public as much as possible, regardless of the consequences. The Lyndon B. Johnson administration in the 1960s, in pushing ahead with the "Great Society" compound social welfare system, said minimal financial deficits would incur. But the program resulted in devastating deficits that even a country as wealthy as the U.S. found difficult to sustain.
Koh Han-suk, a former chief analyst of the Uri Party, recently discussed the new Left¡¯s policy directions in an article in the organ of a New Right faction. In it, he called for the establishment of a fair competition system, attention to human rights in the North, and realistic preparations for inevitable globalization.
Disappointing though the latest news is that the government wants to increase the number of civil servants, there are signs that the era of the Old Left is coming to an end. The vitality of both traditional conservatives and conservative progressives is exhausted. Here is an opportune time for both sides to advance to a higher level through the pain and joy of breaking out of their eggshell. Both camps need to fly higher to improve Korean society. In the words of Jonathan Livingston, seagull, the higher a bird flies, the farther it can see.
The column was contributed by Kang Kyu-hyung, a professor in the Graduate School of Archival Sciences at Myongji University.
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