Reexaming the "Left/Right" paradigm in Korean history..

Recently, I have been reading Kim Ku's autobiography Paekpom Ilchi translated by Jongsoo Lee. In the introduction, Lee talks about how American historiography on Kim Ku has generally treated him as a member of the "far right" which misrepresents the political ideology of Kim Ku. This along with conversations with few of my friends have driven me to reexamine how the "left/right" diagram is generally treated in Korean history and the limitations of it.

When talking about the Korean independence movement and the years immediately following Korean independence, many American historians have separated the two groups into two camps, the left and right. The left normally refers to both Communists and left leaning nationalists such as Yo Un-hyung and Kim Won-bong. The left is generally categorized not only for its progressive political stances (mostly land reform, labor laws, ect) but as well for its tactics and strategy against Japanese colonialism. In contrast to the right, the left has generally been regarded as promoting more militant methods to fighting Japan and relying more on mass movements from the masses for support.

The right in contrast has been used to describe a section of the Korean independence movement that was not only more conservative in its political ideology, but completely different in its strategy on tactics. Believing that reform and raising national consciousness was the best way to achieve independence, they were more willing to compromise with Japanese leaders, a tactic that would hurt their reputation during the war years. The right also relied more heavily on support from outside groups and the elite of Korea, were venomously anti-communist and were more willing to let Japanese collaborators into the political structure. This is best laid out in the first volume of the Origins of the Korean War by Bruce Cummings.

While I don't have much problems with the definitions used for the left (even if they are a bit more broad than I preferred), the definition used to describe the right runs into problems immediately when you bring up people like Kim Ku. Though being associated with the "far right," Kim Ku does not match any of the qualifiers mentioned. When it came to fighting the Japanese he was arguably one of the most militant figures in the Independence Movement, as the KPG would attempt several assassinations under his watch. He had no tolerance for Japanese collaborators which was the major cause for is disgust with the US military government after independence Finally, Kim Ku's popularity was fairly massive which he used to his advantage whenever he can. His failed coup against the US military was not lead by a small group of leaders but consisted of a mass uprising including protests and call for general strikes. Kim Ku's stances on Communism is a bit more murky, as he seemed to shift from being able to work with communists at some points to being against. Though there is no debate that Kim Ku disliked Communism as an ideology, he was willing to work with Communists if he felt that they were sincerely nationalist in their goals. His attack on the Communists during the period from 46-48 seems to be more fueled by the fact that the Communists in the south "betrayed Korea" with their position on the trusteeship. With these facts, its hard to consider Kim Ku a member of the "far right" with this definition.

Kim Ku is not the only figure of the "right" who fails to match up with this definition. Cho Man-sik, though clearly more conservative than Kim Gu, was willing to work with the left (being a fairly large figure in the Korean People's Republic) and had strong grassroots support in Pyongyang. It also cannot be forgotten that Syngman Rhee, the largest figure of the Korean right, had mass support in Korea when he arrived by both the right AND the left due to his nationalist credentials.

Things get even blurrier when examining some of the policies of the "right" during this period. As Hwasook Nam's noted in her book Building Ships, Building a Nation, many people in the right supported progressive labor laws. Even after the "left" had been eradicated, it did not stop the calls for incredibly progressive labor laws, including a labor bill of rights that had a vague clause on the right of workers to have share of the wealth(!). Many members of the right supported land reform, though they had disagreements with the left on how far it should be taken. Many figures of the right opposed the trusteeship which later became the basis for their hatred for the Communist traitors. It seems almost that we have used a definition that only accurately describes a small portion of the right and used it to cover a wide spectrum of beliefs.

For the most part, I have generally separated the Left into two categories; the Communists and the people who I mentally call the Progressive Nationalists. I'm still trying to decipher if there is anyway to separate the "right" into several groups. The term "liberal" is not a bad term to describe figures such as Kim Ku and "moderates" like Kim Kyu-sik but we still run into problems when dealing with the "far right" who had some liberal ideas and tactics. I need to do more research on this matter but unfortunately the amount of work in English on this type of issues is relatively small and outdated. I better start cracking on my Korean I guess...