In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS LOOKING BACK ON THE LONG AND WINDING JOURNEY THAT HAS RESULTED in this book, I feel deep gratitude toward many people who were willing to help and guide me. Without their steadfast encouragement and support, this book would not have been completed. Growing up in the Park Chung Hee era in Seoul, South Korea, and witnessing as a college student the sacrifices my friends and other citizens of Korea made in social and political movements for democracy, an intense interest grew in me about the history behind the sad reality of current affairs in South Korea and the sources of popular resistance to it. Being a participant in the student movement, albeit in a small way, taught me lessons about history and life that will last a lifetime. In addition to this learning outside the classroom, I had the good fortune of studying Korean history with excellent and dedicated teachers at Seoul National University. At that time many of my college friends were giving up their bright career paths and going to factories to become manual worker– organizers. Because of family reasons, I had to resign myself to being an observer of the labor movement in the 1980s, a position that engulfed me for a long time with a deep sense of guilt at not doing all I could for the cause I believed in. When in the 1990s I chose my dissertation topic in the Ph.D. program in history at the University of Washington, I was not only trying to understand the wellsprings of the unusual militancy of South Korean labor, IX manifested in the great labor upsurge of 1987. I was also hoping to come to terms with my life’s choices. I was lucky to have the late Professor James B. Palais as my dissertation adviser. Not only did he teach me how to “do” history; he also showed his students , through his principled actions, what it means to be both a good scholar and a good citizen. An active participant in various activities against the authoritarian regimes of South Korea, Professor Palais enthusiastically supported my plan to study Korean worker activism. He was extremely generous to his students with his time and energy, and his written comments on various versions of my dissertation and the manuscript that became this book were often dozens of long, single-spaced pages. I benefited tremendously from the challenging debates I had with him. I miss dearly his sharp questions and his hearty laughs when on occasion I was able to counter his criticisms well. At the University of Washington, Professors R. Kent Guy, Kenneth B. Pyle, and James Gregory, as my field advisers, extended me unwavering help and support during my long graduate student years and beyond. The Latin American , U.S., and Asian labor history courses taught by professors Chuck Bergquist, James Gregory, Elizabeth Perry, Andrew Gordon, and James Palais further inspired me to pursue the study of labor history from a comparative perspective . At the University of Utah, where I taught for four years after completing my degree in 2003, I was blessed with the friendship and intellectual stimulation of many dear colleagues—in particular, Wesley Sasaki-Uemura, Janet Theiss, Ben Cohen, and Suhi Choi. In doing my research, I benefited greatly from the fine Korea collection of the East Asia Library at the University of Washington, a product in large part of the lifelong endeavors of now-retired Korea librarian Yoon-hwan Choe. The collections at the National Assembly Library and the National Central Library in Korea were also of much help. Conversations with many labor scholars and Koreanists, both in Korea and in the United States, helped me to develop and sharpen my arguments, although any shortcomings of this book are strictly my own. I would like to convey special thanks to Jun Kim, Kyeong-il Kim, Wŏnch’ŏl Sin, Don Smith, and Hagen Koo. Clark Sorensen, the editor of the Korean Studies Series at the University of Washington Press, as well as two outside reviewers of my manuscript—Andrew Gordon and an anonymous reviewer—provided many helpful suggestions to refine my arguments and improve the organization of the manuscript. I am most grateful for their help. I had opportunities to present parts of this book at conferences and colloquia X A C K N O W L E D G M E N T S A C K N O W L E D G M E N T S XI over...

Share