Every Clime, Class and Colour

Who was Park?

Park Chung Hee was the most consequential leader of South Korea in its 80-year history. Born in 1917 to a poor rural family in Gumi when the country was a colony of Japan, his prospects as a young adult was limited. Like many men of his generation, he would go on to join the Japanese Army where he was trained in Manchuria and Tokyo. There he adopted an affinity for Japan and its Meiji restoration.

When World War Two ended he joined the newly created South Korean Army where he was given further training. Despite his pro Japanese past, in 1946 he joined the Korean Workers Party. He was later arrested for this and came close to being killed. Instead, he continued his career in the army and fought in the Korean War for the South.

His post war career saw him rise to the top of the South Korean Army, leaving him in an influential position which he used to his advantage in the 1960s.

Authoritarianism

In 1961 after just a year of democratic rule following Symen Rhee’s exile, Park instigated a bloodless military coup. This ushered in 18 years of uninterrupted rule by Park, where he led at varying times as a civilian albeit authoritarian president and as a full-blown military dictator.

His most infamous creation as leader was the Korean Central Intelligence Agency, or KCIA. It quickly became the most feared organisation in the country and became notorious for murdering, kidnapping and torturing of his political opponents. Along with the military it was also used routinely to crack down on protests and strikes.

As a now militant anti-communist, he was widely supported by the United State who appreciated South Koreas deployment of troops to Vietnam in 1964. Parks grip on the country reached new heights during the 1970s. The KCIA was given a wider leash to crack down on his opponents. Descent was met with violence. In August 1973 opposition leader Kim Daejung was kidnapped by Park and taken out on a fishing boat to be drowned. He was only spared when a Japanese plane flew directly over the ship as a warning. By intervention of the Us Ambassador and Japanese, his life was spared. Most were not so lucky.

In 1974 Parks wife was shot dead by a bullet meant for him. He grew more isolated and increasingly unpopular. Something had to change and indeed it did. In 1979 Park was shot dead by his close friend Kim Jaegyu, the director of the KCIA, while having dinner. His 18 years of rule was over. But despite his violent rule two million Koreans attended his funeral, many genuinely mournful. Why? Because of the Miracle on the Han River.

Miracle on the Han River

Following the Korean was the country was incredibly poor. In fact, it was one of the poorest countries in the world. Park changed this. He brought in reforms which fuelled industrialisation. The nation underwent what is known as compressed development. In barely three decades South Koreas economy developed at a rate which took western countries 1 to 2 hundred years to accomplish. Between 1963 and 1979 the GDP rate grew by 10% per year. This became known as the miracle on the Han River, after the body of water that flows through Seoul.

Imagine being a born a peasant on a farm your parents rented from a local landlord. You are illiterate and your parents have always struggled to feed you. You live through Japan’s colonisation, WW2 and the Korean War by the time you are 20. By the time you are fifty you live in a modern apartment with appliances such as a tv and fridge. You eat three times a day, as does your children. You have a decent job at a local factory, albeit you work long hours. If you are lucky, you may be saving some money to go on a holiday. That radical change was experienced by millions of Koreans under Parks dictatorship.

While development created new social problems for many, nobody could doubt that Park had improved the country by the time of his death.

Contested Legacy

Parks legacy is complicated, naturally so given the circumstances. He was a brutal dictator and an economic revolutionary. Because of his reforms South Korea Is now one of the wealthiest nations on earth. But he also oppressed his own people to get there, and his authoritarian governance led to brutal crackdowns on Korea’s democracy movement. His popularity was sufficient for his daughter to be elected President in 2013. Park geun Hye as she is known received most of her support from Koreas Elderly. They remembered her father’s rule and how it changed the country.

Parks story is a reminder of the complexities of leaders and how they can improve or devastate their people’s lives.

Sources

Cha, Victor D and Pardao, Ramon P. 2023. Korea: A New History of South and North. Yale University Press: New Haven.

Pardo, Ramon. 2022. Shrimp to Whale: South Korea from the Forgotten War to K-POP. C. Hurst& Co: London.

Hwang, Kyung Moon. 2001. A History of Korea. Bloomsbury: London.

Peter, A.  M. 2012.  Democratisation and National Development: A Comparative Analysis of  Nigeria and  South  Korea, 1999  to  2009. (https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320347170_DEMOCRATISATION_AND_NATIONAL_DEVELOPMENT_A_COMPARATIVE_ANALYSIS_OF_NIGERIA_AND_SOUTH_KOREA).