I read this editorial over at the English version of Hankyoreh:
One out of every four men who married in farming and fishing regions last year married a foreign woman. 90 percent of those women are from China, the Philippines, and Vietnam. Korea has been solving the problem of difficult work others hate to do with foreign labor, and now it is having Asian women take the place of Korean women in farming and fishing communities that Korean women want to avoid.Experts say that Korea is already no longer a homogeneous society, and that is has already essentially become a immigrant nation. As of last year foreign workers topped 420,000 and foreign wives numbered more than 50,000. Naturally there is a continuous rise in the number of children who have mothers or fathers from China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand, Mongolia, Russia, the US, and Japan. Given the fact Korea has a low birth rate and is aging and how international interaction is on the rise, the trend is going to accelerate. The problem is that our understanding of the situation and our society’s preparedness lags far behind that trend.
Just as has been the case with foreign labor, marriage to foreigners has run into various problems. Many hasty-arranged marriages done with the assistance of professional agencies end in divorce. They say that applications for divorce by marriages involving spouses from China and Vietnam recently almost doubled. Domestic violence against foreign wives is becoming a problem. There are also problems involving the language development and social adjustment of children whose mothers lack proficient Korean language skills.
It is time our country formulate real plans as a multi-ethnic society. To begin with, there needs to be better oversight of the international marriage agencies. Foreign spouses need to be given help in adjusting socially, through Korean language and cultural education. There needs to be counseling for the problems faced by international families. Most importantly we need to have open hearts that accept them as members of Korean society.
A similar editorial is found in The Korea Times which adds more detail:
But the problems of “mail-order brides” are complex. The most common of them are frequent and early divorces, caused mostly by husbands’ violence, language barriers and culture gaps. Korea’s nationality act that turns foreign spouses who divorce before two years of marriage into illegal aliens is virtually encouraging these abuses. In some cases, Korean men fall to becoming the victims of foreign women, who use the nuptial contracts as just a means of entering the country and finding jobs.
It is time for the government to step in. It should first enhance administrative surveillance on international matchmaking agencies. These go-between agents are now mushrooming, as they infrequently report to the authorities. So, the government should introduce a licensing system. It also needs to run an educational institution to help foreign wives adjust to the Korean language and other ways of life. The recently reborn Ministry of Gender Equality and Family would be best to do it.
Since the 1980s, the discrepancy in the ratio of males and females in Korea has exceeded 11:10. This means the culture shock and family violence resulting from biracial marriages could continue in the next 20 years or so, unless there are some systemic improvements. The government should set up an agency responsible for receiving reports of abuse, survey the situations and protect foreign wives. Koreans need to recall the mistreatment suffered by Korean women married to American soldiers.
Just a few passing comments. It is promising to see admissions that Korea is not a homogeneous society. This will hopefully begin the process of getting it to stop acting like it is one. It is also promising to see that they want Koreans to have “open hearts” that accept these international spouses as members of Korean society. Also, I also am really happy to recognition of abuse in many such brokered relationships and the problems of, for example, the two year rule which compounds an already unequal power relationship.
Apparently however, multi-ethnic does not mean a multi-cultural or a multi-lingual society. While it is certainly not objectionable to to want to each Korean language and culture to those who arrive, I suspect that, as in the case of the Danish immigration policies, the line between government programs to help newcomers to adjust to a new environment and organized cultural assimilation is a fine one. I think Korea will have to come to terms that its future is one in which not only new ethnic groups but new languages and cultures will become omnipresent in its society.
UPDATE: See this fantastic, if sometimes quite emotional posting over at Metropolitician which talks about many issues related to interracial couples and identity in Korea.
そういえばオランダでは移民が増えすぎてオランダ人が外国に逃げてるそうだね。
反イスラム的な人は命も危ないらしい。
誰か殺されてなかった？
If some people are leaving the Netherlands because they don’t like the ethnic or cultural make up of their society, that is perfectly acceptable to me.
I don’t believe there is such a thing as “移民が増えすぎて”
Maybe you will change your mind when イスラム教徒はオランダ人から差別的な課税（JIZYA）を取れ、オランダの民族性を抹殺する時に。
I would be fascinated to know what these (clearly far-right) commentators are saying in Japanese.
I thought you dealt with them pretty well on the ‘drawings’ post. To be honest though, I’m not sure how much dialogue there is to be had with these people – be careful.
On the subject in hand, I must say that I found the Korea Times editorial had a typically patronising tone, although the Hankyoreh editorial was much better. It is indeed good to see this sort of topic being discussed openly in Korea. Of course the diversification of Korea will mean change, but the fact is no society ever stays the same, or ever had a ‘pure’ culture, however many nationalist myths we might invent to say it did.
Thanks Kotaji, there is certainly a danger in wasting my time in responding to them – and being dragged into answering issues on their terms and with their often hugely problematic assumptions. On the other had, I also don’t want to come across as not encouraging any kind of dialogue…
I have a feeling we’re dealing with fascists here: the ‘Muslims are taking over Europe’ theme is one of the favourites for neo-Nazis and fellow-travellers around Europe these days (I’m guessing this is what they’re talking about in Japanese).
“I would be fascinated to know what these (clearly far-right) commentators are saying in Japanese.”
dude, are you serious? You dont know what they are writing but they are ‘clearly far-right’? Thats strikes me as a little narrow (well, very narrow).
“I thought you dealt with them pretty well on the ‘drawings’ post. To be honest though, I’m not sure how much dialogue there is to be had with these people – be careful.”
LOL. What is it exactly that muninn should be careful of? Repetitive Strain Injury from typing replies to ‘Japanese far-rightists’?
“I have a feeling we’re dealing with fascists here: the ‘Muslims are taking over Europe’ theme is one of the favourites for neo-Nazis and fellow-travellers around Europe these days (I’m guessing this is what they’re talking about in Japanese).”
So no race or culture has ever taken over or dominated another? I find your skepticism amusing, especially when considering the history of Islam.
Kotaji, I agree with you entirely that neo-Nazis, populists, and nationalists of all stripes have raised the scare flag on Muslims in Europe. This is hugely prevalent among even moderates in Norway and dominates reporting on them in the press. Even my usually tolerant friends and relatives there make disturbing comments at times.
I support the fast and – as smoothly as possible – the welcome integration of these communities, through naturalization or extension of political rights to Muslims (and all other newcomers) in those areas to which they migrate. This will increase their stake in those communities and encourage political and personal dialogue between them on a more equal and productive basis. We must overcome the racism and rampant ignorance which lies behind discourses of “immigrant crime waves” and “unreforming illiberal fundamentalists” as the dominant symbols of these very diverse communities.
I don’t think it is a trivial point, however, to think long and hard about the many contradictions between our strong instincts towards toleration and sympathy for a diversity of cultural practices and the many real instances in which these instincts contradict directly with our equally firm convictions and support for liberal enlightenment values of equality.
I think, for example, we are losing the battle (as the existence of people such as shakuhachi plus most libertarians and many moderates in our various homelands) in trying to deal with these contradictions and convincing people like shakuhachi or other exclusionists, racists, and anti-immigration populists that the solution is not to portray these newcomers as evil barbarians whose failure to assimilate to the “civilized host culture” exhibit some kind of incorrigable natural feature of their ethnic or religious groups.
It is an uphill battle and unfortunately, ignorance still holds the day.
I don’t think I’m as pessimistic as you Muninn. What you say may be true elsewhere in Europe, but in the UK the hard racists are very much marginalised these days. That’s not to say that there aren’t problems of course, but the far right has not been able to capitalise at all on the post 9/11 scenario. The Tories tried the anti-immigration populism thing at the last election and totally failed. In fact the biggest political outcome here has been the massive anti-war movement which has seen the coming together of peace activists, Muslims, the left, the liberal centre and a host of other sections of society.
I hope you are right kotaji, but I still think we don’t have an effective resolution to the issues of contradiction themselves and I think they add to a rhetorical weakness in politics…
i feel pretty unequipped to contribute to this discussion but wanted to add an anecdote.
i just came from 2 months on exchange at a technical university in Delft, Holland. engineering schools are more or less political and social vacuums but i had a few off campus excursions and got to see a little bit.
i was visiting a gym in the east end of the hague and had to walk about 5km to get there. i ended up passing through some kind of muslim ghetto, and all of a sudden the world was totally different. nowhere were there the 8-foot tall blond dutch that roam everywhere else. nor anyone else for that matter, save people I assumed from appearances to be islamic. halfway through the area, a man started to yell at me in some language; at the time everything i heard sounded like drunken pirate garble so i can’t say what he was speaking.
i made it through without trouble, but it stands out in my mind as the clearest cultural/religious barrier i saw in europe. whereas other national tensions didn’t seem to escalate beyond the kind of superficial rufflings and half-taunts that canadians enjoy with americans, there was a whole different FEEL about the muslim/non-muslim interface.
anyway, that may be stating the obvious. its the only 2 cents i have.
Why is this blog blocking comments?
Hi Nora,
Sorry for the inconvenience!
I have turned comment moderation on. I get a lot of spam so I filter comments coming through here. Also, I very occasionally delete comments I judge to be hateful, irrelevant, or otherwise inappropriate for display on my website.
I try to moderate comments at least once a day.
That’s too bad.
But I wonder all of them are really spams?
I look through most things, but it is true, I have it configured to automatically delete words with certain key words that pop up in spam that is trying to link to pages selling things. Basically it is a risk I am willing to take to save me time…spam is such a huge problem with the blogs I manage that it becomes a question of “How much time are you willing you spend reading through ads for medications and more unsavoury products.” It is certainly possible that there are some false positives.
As for non-spam deleted comments, I have only deleted 2 comments I thought were inappropriate so far, and I hope I don’t have to in the future :-)