South Korea THE CHOSoN DYNASTY
Statue of King Sejong (1418-50), Toksu Palace, Seoul
Courtesy Oren Hadar
The Koryo Dynasty had suffered from a number of internal
problems; Yi and his followers implemented drastic reforms to
place the new dynasty on firmer ground. One of these problems
revolved around the deterioration of land administration, a basic
issue in a predominantly agrarian society. Contrary to the law
specifying public (governmental) ownership of land, powerful
clans and Buddhist temples had acquired a sizable proportion of
farmland. By exacting a disproportionate share of crops in the
form of rents, the "landlords" were causing economic destitution
and social discontent among the peasants. By illicitly removing
the farms from tax rolls, these clans and temples reduced the
government's income, thus straining the treasury. Yi had sided
with reformists even before he took power, hence it was natural
for him to rectify past inequities after ascending to the throne.
The reform of the land system, however, had direct
repercussions on the practice of Buddhism, because Buddhist
temples and monks had been among those exacerbating the land
problem. The economic influence of the temples was eliminated
when they lost vast lands. The rectification went beyond economic
reform, however, because the dominant forces in the new dynasty
were devout Confucianists who regarded Buddhism as a false creed.
The fact that Buddhist monks had wielded a strong influence in
politics, the economy, and society during the latter part of the
Koryo Dynasty--and that many of them had been corrupted by power
and money--strengthened the opposition to Buddhism. Accordingly,
the new dynasty launched a sweeping attack on Buddhism and its
institutions, an attack that had profound and enduring effects on
the character of civilization on the peninsula.
Many of the outstanding temples were permitted to remain
intact; indeed, a few Choson monarchs were devout Buddhists.
Nevertheless, Buddhism exerted little influence over the
religious life of Korea under the Choson Dynasty; nor did any
organized religion replace it. Although many people adhered to
shamanism, geomancy, fortunetelling, and superstitions, Korea
effectively became a secular society.
The Choson Dynasty had an auspicious beginning. During the
reign of the fourth monarch, King Sejong (1418-50), a Buddhist,
enormous strides were made in the arts, science, and technology.
The Korean script, known as
han'gul (see Glossary), which
eventually came into common usage in the twentieth century, was
developed by scholars at that time.
After Sejong, however, the dynasty fell into the hands of
lesser men, and in the late fifteenth century the country began a
long decline. Succession to the throne often caused long and
bitter struggles, particularly when a ruler did not leave behind
an heir who had reached the age of majority. Members of the
Confucian-educated, scholar-official elite
yangban (see Glossary)
class quarreled over minor points of Confucian ritual
and etiquette, especially the proper period of mourning upon the
death of a royal personage. Factional groups began vying for
power, frequently going to the extreme of exterminating the
members of defeated factions. The civil service examination
became a sham, and corruption ran rampant. Royal relatives and
members of powerful factions increased their landholdings, which
became exempt from taxes and thereby reduced the dynasty's
sources of revenue. The farmers suffered more and more from tax
burdens and other extractions imposed by greedy officials and
landlords. In short, the country was not being effectively
governed. To make matters worse, Japanese attacks in 1592 and
1597 and Manchu assaults in 1627 and 1636 ravaged the country's
economy and turned much of the farmland to waste for a long
period thereafter.
The resulting social and economic depression of the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries fostered the rise of a new
intellectual movement advocating the practical use of human
knowledge. Pioneered by a Confucian scholar named Yi Su-kwang,
the new thought--soon to be called Sirhak (practical
learning)--was partly inspired by the firsthand knowledge of
occidental sciences that Yi Su-kwang had acquired while on
official visits to Beijing. As historian Ki-baik Lee has noted,
Sirhak thought encompassed a variety of intellectual activities
and several diverse viewpoints. These included proposals for
refinement of the traditional administrative and land systems,
advocacy of commercial and manufacturing activity, and a renewed
interest in Korean history and language. Brought to maturity in
the late eighteenth century by Chong Yag-yong, the Sirhak
Movement was supported by a group of discontented scholars, petty
officials, former bureaucrats, and commoners.
The Sirhak Movement found itself in direct confrontation with
the dominant trend in neo-Confucian thought, which stressed the
metaphysical and abstract teachings of the renowned Chinese
philosopher Zhu Xi
(see Traditional Social Structure
, ch. 2).
Neither the efforts of such wise and able kings as Yongjo
(1725-75) and Chongjo (1776-1800), nor those of the Sirhak
scholars, were able to reverse the trend against empirical
studies and good government.
Western ideas, including Christianity, reached Korea through
China in the seventeenth century. By 1785, however, the
government had become incensed over the rejection of ancestor
worship by Roman Catholic missionaries, and it banned all forms
of Western learning. Western ships began to approach Korean
shores after 1801, seeking trade and other contacts, but the
government rejected all overtures from abroad. When news of the
Opium War in China (1839-42) reached Korea, the dynasty had all
the more reason to shut the doors tightly against Western
"barbarians." In the meantime, the Choson Dynasty suffered from a
series of natural calamities including floods, famines, and
epidemics, as well as large-scale revolts of the masses in the
northwest (1811-12) and southwest (1862 and 1894-95).
The expansion of Western powers in East Asia in the
nineteenth century significantly altered the established order,
in which Korea had been dominated by China. China under the Qing
Dynasty (1644-1911) was in decline; its power waned rapidly under
the concerted attacks of such Western nations as France, Britain,
and Russia. Stimulated by these events, Japan proceeded to
modernize after having been forced to open its ports by Commodore
Matthew C. Perry of the United States Navy in 1853-54. Korea,
however, remained dormant, having closed itself to all outside
contacts in the early eighteenth century.
The Japanese were the first foreign power in recent history
to succeed in penetrating Korea's isolation. After a warlike
Japanese provocation against Korea in 1875 (when China failed to
come to Korea's aid), the Japanese forced an unequal treaty on
Korea in February 1876. The treaty gave Japanese nationals
extraterritorial rights and opened up three Korean ports to
Japanese trade. In retaliation, China sought to counter Japan by
extending Korea's external relations and playing off one Western
power against another. Accordingly, Korea signed treaties with
the United States, Britain, Italy, Russia, and other countries
were signed within the decade after the one with Japan.
Internally, the Korean court split into rival pro-Chinese,
pro-Japanese, and pro-Russian factions, the latter two having
more reformist and modernizing orientations. In 1895 the Japanese
minister to Korea masterminded the assassination of the Korean
queen, who with her clan had opposed reform-oriented,
Japanese-supported leaders. The Korean king, however, rejected
not only Japan but also the various reform measures and turned
for support to one of Japan's adversaries--Russia. The king fled
to the Russian legation in Seoul to avoid possible Japanese plots
against him and conducted the nation's business from there. The
Japanese blunder had served the Russians well.
In the meantime, under the leadership of So Chae-p'il, who
had exiled himself to the United States after participating in an
unsuccessful palace coup in 1884, a massive campaign was launched
to advocate Korean independence from foreign influence and
controls. As well as supporting Korean independence, So also
advocated reform in Korea's politics and customs in line with
Western practices. Upon his return to Korea in 1896, So published
Tongnip simmun (The Independent), the first newspaper to
use the han'gul writing system and the vernacular
language, which attracted an ever-growing audience
(see The Korean Language
, ch. 2). He also organized the Independence Club
to introduce Korea's elite to Western ideas and practices. Under
his impetus and the influence of education provided by Protestant
mission schools, hundreds of young men held mass meetings on the
streets and plazas demanding democratic reforms and an end to
Russian and Japanese domination. But the conservative forces
proved to be too deeply entrenched for the progressive reformers
who trashed the paper's offices. The reformers, including Syngman
Rhee, then a student leader, were jailed. So was compelled to
return to the United States in 1898, and under one pretext or
another the government suppressed both the reform movement and
its newspaper.
The revolt of 1894-95, known as the Tonghak Rebellion, had
international repercussions. Like the Taiping rebels in China
thirty years earlier, the
Tonghak (see Glossary) participants
were fired by religious fervor as well as by indignation about
the corrupt and oppressive government. The rebellion spread from
the southwest to the central region of the peninsula, menacing
Seoul. The Korean court apparently felt unable to cope with the
rebels and invited China to send troops to quell the rebellion.
This move gave Japan a pretext to dispatch troops to Korea. The
two countries soon engaged in the First Sino-Japanese War
(1894-95), which accelerated the demise of the Qing Dynasty in
China.
The victorious Japanese established their hegemony over Korea
via the Treaty of Shimonoseki (1895) and dictated to the Korean
government a wide-ranging series of measures to prevent further
domestic disturbances. In response, the government promulgated
various reforms, including the abolition of class distinctions,
the liberation of slaves, the abolition of the ritualistic civil
service examination system, and the adoption of a new tax system.
Russian influence had been on the rise in East Asia, in
direct conflict with the Japanese desire for expansion. In
alliance with France and Germany, Russia had just forced Japan to
return the Liaodong Peninsula to China (which Japan had seized
during the First Sino-Japanese War) and then promptly leased the
territory from China. The secret Sino-Russian treaty signed in
1896 also gave the Russians the right to build and operate the
Chinese Eastern Railway across northern Manchuria, which served
as a link in the Russian Trans-Siberian Railway to Vladivostok.
Russia proceeded to acquire numerous concessions over Korea's
forests and mines.
The strategic rivalry between Russia and Japan exploded in
the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5, won by Japan. Under the peace
treaty signed in September 1905, Russia acknowledged Japan's
"paramount political, military, and economic interest" in Korea.
A separate agreement signed in secret between the United States
and Japan at this time subsequently aroused anti-American
sentiment among Koreans. The Taft-Katsura Agreement was cynical
by modern standards, exchanging what amounted to a lack of
interest and military capability in Korea on the part of the
United States (Japan was given a free hand in Korea) for a lack
of interest or capability in the Philippines on the part of Japan
(Japanese imperialism was diverted from the Philippines). Given
the diplomatic conventions of the times, however, the agreement
was a much weaker endorsement of the Japanese presence in Korea
than either the Russo-Japanese peace treaty or a separate Anglo-
Japanese accord. Two months later, Korea was obliged to become a
Japanese protectorate. Thereafter, a large number of Koreans
organized themselves in education and reform movements, but by
then Japanese dominance in Korea was a reality. Japan annexed
Korea as a colony on August 22, 1910.
Data as of June 1990
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