South Korean Political Culture: An Interpretation of Survey Data

Articles South Korean Political Culture: An Interpretation of Survey Data L. L. WADE lhis paper summarizes and interprets a body of survey research data bearing on the political culture of South Korea.1 Political culture is understood by political scientists as "the beliefs, expressive symbols, and values which define the situation in which political action takes place" and asserts that the relationship between culture and political practice is indispensable to the understanding of any political system and to assessments of its future.2 The considerable discrepancy in Korea between culture and observed behavior, as it is revealed in the survey research discussed here, has had important consequences, some of which are alluded to in the conclusion.3 I wish to thank Alexander J. Groth, Donald Rothchild, Charles Hardin, Chalmers Johnson, Kim Bong-sik, Yoo Jong-hae, Shim Won-hyoung, Hwang Okyearn , James B. Palais, and Bruce Cumings for sharing their always informed and sometimes vigorous criticisms of the draft manuscript. None is responsible for the errors in which I have persisted. 1.AU known pertinent publications, in both Korean and English, were examined in the research process, although, for editorial reasons, not all are cited here. Newspaper opinion polls were found to be of little direct interest. Government -sponsored surveys to which I could not gain access have also been conducted from time to time. 2.Sidney Verba, "Comparative Political Culture," in Political Culture and Political Development, ed. Lucien Pye and Sidney Verba (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1965), p. 513. 3.It is well to note that other scholars with other approaches (e.g., historical, anthropological, or psychoanalytic) have found less divergence between the attitudinal and behavioral realms, as, for example, in the historical approach of Gregory Henderson, Korea: The Politics of the Vortex (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968); the anthropological approach of Vincent S. R. Brandt, "Sociocultural Aspects of Political Participation in Rural Korea," The Journal 2 Journal ofKorean Studies Several comments are necessary before proceeding to the discussion proper. This paper attempts to identify converging patterns from a number of empirical investigations and does not rely on the findings of any one scholar or the reliability and validity of any one data base. The occasional relaxation of conventional methodological rigor in the literature has been accepted in this exploratory statement to avoid the alternative danger of neglecting potentially interesting insights that may inhere in studies to which certain objections might be made on methodological grounds. It is for the reader to decide whether the resulting argument is a reasonable or compelling one. Second, one is aware of the skepticism sometimes maintained toward survey data collected in a culture in which attitudinal surveys, themselves an alien institution, solicit choices and preferences that are not always present, and hence are "unrealistic," or which are thought likely to arouse apprehensions and qualified responses among respondents who fear for their anonymity. It is quite true that survey research in Korea must be done circumspectly or not at all if the regime's legitimacy figures obviously in the research, and due discretion must be used in interpreting attitudinal data respecting Korean politics. At their best, interview data in any setting are only clues that the scholar must use critically and imaginatively in relating them to larger theoretical concerns. Third, no operational definition of political culture is attempted here. This is an effort that seeks to distill meaning from a number of studies conducted by scholars whose terms, purposes, and research designs were never intended to be juxtaposed in the present manner. In these circumstances, only a broad and nondogmatic use of the term political culture is in order, although an effort has been made to keep usage within reasonable and recognizable limits. Finally, traditional and colonial Korean political culture, although indispensable to present understanding, is, except for brief references, beyond the scope of this essay.4 The study of political culture assumes that the political behavior of individuals and the performance and durability of the polity are of Korean Studies 1 (1979): 205-23; and the psychological approach of Yoon Woo-kon, "Korean Bureaucrats' Behavior," Korea Journal 14(1974): 22-39. It is not suggested that these scholars arrive at...