Relational Pasts: The Conflictual International Politics of Memory and the Japan-South Korea History Problem

Many international relationships have a difficult history – of wars, of atrocities, of colonial subjugation – but only some of these nations clash over that history in a way that profoundly affects their relationship still today.

Why, for example, do France and Germany or the United Kingdom and India have a largely positive relationship not overly influenced by their history of war and imperialism, while South Korea and Japan's relationship is still deeply haunted by the memory of Japanese colonial rule? How can we understand the persistence of such historical antagonisms several decades after the relevant events, and how might those antagonisms be overcome?

This book draws on literature concerning memory, national identity and ontological security to develop a theoretical framework that seeks to explain how and why international conflict concerning the past arises and endures and how it may be transformed, and applies this to the so-called 'history problem' in Japan-South Korea relations through a discourse analysis of a vast dataset of primary sources, from both South Korea and Japan, across politics, media and culture. In doing so, it argues that conflictual narratives of the past have come to form core constructs of national identity in South Korea and Japan, such that the reproduction of the history problem has been caught up in the reproduction and securing of these very nations themselves – but also such that a transformation of national identity could transform the status quo of conflictual relations.

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This event is free, open to the public, and held in person only.

Organiser

This event has been organised by the SOAS Centre of Korean Studies.