Nation Building In South Korea

In this ambitious and innovative study Gregg Brazinsky examines American nation building in South Korea during the Cold War. Marshaling a vast array of new American and Korean sources, he explains why South Korea was one of the few postcolonial nations that achieved rapid economic development and democratization by the end of the twentieth century. Brazinsky contends that a distinctive combination of American initiatives and Korean agency enabled South Korea's stunning transformation. On one hand, Americans supported the emergence of a developmental autocracy that spurred economic growth in a highly authoritarian manner. On the other hand, Americans sought to encourage democratization from the bottom up by fashioning new institutions and promoting a dialogue about modernization and development. Expanding the framework of traditional diplomatic history, Brazinsky examines not only state-to-state relations, but also the social and cultural interactions between Americans and South Koreans. He shows how Koreans adapted, resisted, and transformed American influence and promoted socioeconomic change that suited their own aspirations. Ultimately, Brazinsky argues, Koreans' capacity to tailor American institutions and ideas to their own purposes was the most important factor in the making of a democratic South Korea.

This book offers new insight on how key historical texts and events in Korea's history have contributed to the formation of the nation's collective consciousness. The work is woven around the unifying premise that particular narrative texts/events that extend back to the premodern period have remained important, albeit transformed, over the modern period and into the contemporary period. The author explores the relationship between gender and nationalism by showing how key narrative topics, such as tales of virtuous womanhood, have been employed, transformed, and re-deployed to make sense of particular national events. Connecting these narratives and historic events to contemporary Korean society, Jager reveals how these "sites" - or reference points - were also successfully re-deployed in the context of the division of Korea and the construction of Korea's modern consciousness.

Nation building has been a ubiquitous component of American foreign policy during the last century. The United States has attempted to create and sustain nation-states that advance its interests and embody its ideals in places ranging from the Philippines to Vietnam to Iraq. At no time did Washington engage in nation building more intensively than during the Cold War. The United States deemed capturing the loyalties of the vast regions of the globe emerging from colonialism as crucial to the struggle against Communism. To achieve this end it launched vast efforts to carve diverse parts of Asia, Africa, and Latin America into reliable ''Free World'' allies. U.S. officials believed that, by providing the right kinds of resources, they could stimulate economic development and democratization in regions where neither of these phenomena had made significant inroads. This book examines one of the most extensive, costly, and arguably successful of these efforts - South Korea.... Throughout these chapters, I have sought to demonstrate the agency of South Koreans in determining the ultimate impact of the United States on their society. To the extent that the U.S. influence could be called hegemonic, American hegemony was a dialectical process that Koreans played a significant role in shaping. To emphasize this point, I have approached the process of nation building from both sides through the use of American and Korean sources. This analysis makes it clear that the evolution of the South Korea we know today did not entirely reflect the will of Americans or Koreans. It was achieved only through constant negotiation between the two. ----Preface.

This book explores South Korean responses to the architecture of the Japanese colonial occupation of Korea and the ways that architecture illustrates the relationship between difficult heritage and the formation of national identity. Detailing the specific case of Seoul, Hyun Kyung Lee investigates how buildings are selectively destroyed, preserved, or reconstructed in order to either establish or challenge the cultural identity of places as new political orders are developed. In addition, she illuminates the Korean traditional concept of feng shui as a core indigenous framework for understanding the relationship between space and power, as it is associated with nation-building processes and heritagization. By providing a detailed study of a case little known outside of East Asia, ‘Difficult Heritage’ in Nation Building will expand the framework of Western-centered heritage research by introducing novel Asian perspectives.

Nation Building: The Geopolitical History of Korea provides a history of Korea from a geopolitical perspective, emphasizing Korea's relations with China, Japan, Russia, and the United States. The author presents fresh, up-to-date views on the development of Korea. He begins with the founding of Korea and depicts the nature of the Koryo Dynasty and the Northern Tribes, the Chosun Society and the Confucian Heritage of Korea through the beginning of Western influence on the country. Emphasis moves to the period of Japan's domination of Korea and eventually to the effects of the US-USSR rivalry on their relationships with Korea. The author relates the Korean War as a civil international conflict and lays out the effects of the war. The conclusion discusses the economic development within Korea and the changes in relations with the country.