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Until the founding of the republic 60 years ago, we never had the concept that sovereignty resides with the people. But as could be seen in the protests against U.S. beef imports, the country has swung to the other extreme, and people now uphold Article 1 of the Constitution as if everyone of them were sovereign. That is a tremendous change. Leaping over a process other countries took centuries to achieve in 60-odd years, "our nation, freeing itself from the subjection of a feudalistic tribe, was reborn as a people in modern perception, nourishing social capabilities, determining its own fate and making decisions as sovereign subjects." The quote comes from "Re-recognition of the 60 Years of Our National Founding" edited by Kim Young-ho.
How did this happen? Academics have offered varying observations, but, when the history of our development is compressed, it cannot be denied that we learned democracy from the U.S. and advanced to the world after freeing ourselves from the yokes of China and Japan. Though we boast a 5,000-year history, it was China that weighed heavy on us for most of the period, and Japan that brought us to the brink of extinction in modern times. Our nation has never harmed them; they have harmed us for thousands of years. If we have grievances, they are against China and Japan.
Over the past 60 years, we have grown enough to compete with China and Japan on an equal footing. During those 60 years, our nation was able to enjoy the most vigorous life in our 5,000-year history, and in that sense the last 60 years are more valuable than all the other 5,000 taken together.
There are signs of revisionism in the country and the region, stoked by Kim Dae-jung administration's "one nation" policy, the Roh Moo-hyun administration's " Northeast Asia balancer" theory and the Left's anti-Americanism. Taking advantage of it, Japan claims its territorial rights to the Dokdo islets and China, through the Northeast Project, claims to have been the ancient master of East Asia. The Asian hegemony game between Japan and China, fueled by economic strength, is starting again. Despite having grown into an economic power, Japan seems unable to outgrow the memory of its colonization of Korea; China, buoyed by rapid economic growth, seems unable to free itself from nostalgia. And both South and North Korea, sandwiched between them, are walking a course that is harmful to themselves.
It has long been questioned why East Asia cannot be rallied into something resembling the European Union. But Northeast Asia cannot do what the EU has done. Despite hundreds of years of wars including the two world wars, European countries grasped each others' hands based on reflection on the past. In addition to sharing similar economic strength and national might, they lack the history of annexing neighboring countries. Hence European counties opted for global competition through integration in place of consuming confrontation. China and Japan cannot become allies, nor do they want to. That may be the difference between Asia and Europe. So long as it cannot secure national strength equal to theirs, South Korea remains a potential prey to their schemes, not a ¡°balancer." That is what our 5,000-year history has taught us.
The path the republic should choose must lie in the extension of the past 60 years. In short, we should not remain stuck between China and Japan, but boldly step outside and advance to the world. China and Japan had territorial ambitions on the Korean Peninsula. Though the times have changed, there are no signs that they have abandoned them, far from it. But the U.S. has no territorial ambition on our country. It depends on us whether we lose or gain in our transactions with America.
We suffer from various side-effects of the compressed growth in the past 60 years. Shallow leadership, serious ideological confrontation and immaturity for globalization hamper us. Even so, we cannot stop where we are now, nor can we retreat. If we stop, we will be overtaken by other countries; if we retreat, China and Japan will wait to swallow us. The lesson of the 60 years since the founding of the republic is that the path we chose is right, and that there is no other.
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