Neo-Confucianism in South Korea Michael

Neo-Confucianism in South Korea

Michael Lortz

Dr. Alexandra Albrecht

Neo-Confucianism in South Korea

The purpose of the present paper is to discuss neo-Confucianism in South Korea, more exactly, to analyze the manner in which the three bonds and five cardinal relationships of neo-Confucianism are applied to various aspects of modern South Korean life.

Right from the beginning it must be underlined that while there is more than one important religion in Korea, Confucianism managed to impose itself as the most relevant through the impact which it had upon the formation of beliefs and attitudes in people. In this regard, authors such as Peterson (26) claim that "large percentages of Koreans claim to be Buddhist or Christian or followers of Shamanism, but everyone in Korea, to one degree or another is Confucian. Even those who practice other religions (including those who openly criticize Confucianism) perform Confucian rituals on a regular basis and adhere to other Confucian values in their everyday life."

One if the proofs which can be brought in order to support this important impact are represented by the money, in the sense that the contemporary paper currency features three figures which belong to the Confucian current. One is a king, but the others are scholars and their merits are derived from the contributions which they have made to the interpretation of Confucian texts in the past. Usually people tend to put the most important and representative figures of their cultural and political history on the money, which also supports our previous thesis.

The main values which Confucius believed to be the most important for everyday life, from a both short- and long-term perspective are loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and trust. It must be underlined that the Confucian principles teach people not only how to lead their day-to-day lives, but they are also meant to contribute to the political and social government. From this point-of-view, the ethic principles which Confucius tried to teach can be considered principles that can be applied both at personal and collective level. (Koo,50)

The purpose of the philosopher is the well being of the individual, but also the one of society. This argument is important in explaining the impact that Confucianism had on Korean society. Confucianism was defined as the metaphysics of this world, because it was concerned with achieving happiness and well being in this life and not in a possible after life. The main principles upon which the entire Confucian philosophy is based are known under the name of "the three bonds and the five cardinal relationships."

The difference between the bonds and the relationships is that the former ones are not subject to any kind of change. The bonds include the relationships between sovereign and subject, parent and child, husband and wife. While it is easy to understand why the last two are considered bonds, since they are based on strong feelings in the case of the wife and husband and also on blood ties in the case of parents and children, one might be surprised at the blood lines between sovereign and subject. (Weiming,27)

It is obvious that there is an entire ethics behind this kind of reasoning. It implies that the sovereign has a sort of sacred duty towards the subject who has elected him in order to represent and defend his interests and vice versa. Reading between the lines, one understands that the quality of the relationships is the same in all three cases. Therefore, those implications one might find let us say in the parent-child relationship are also transferred to the other two.

What is striking is that Confucius conceives in the same manner the relationships which belong to both the private and the public sphere in which the individual moves. This demonstrates that these areas are strongly connected and that the ethics which regulates them ought not to be different. This is striking for a viewer coming from a western cultural paradigm. However, one easily understands that the efficacy principle is based on loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and trust, which judged from this perspective acquire a whole new dimension.

The five relationships on the other hand are defined as it follows: 1.between sovereign and subject there is justice, 2. between father and son there is closeness, 3. between husband and wife there is separation of duties, 4.between senior and junior there is order, 5. between friend and friend there is trust. One can easily notice that the relationships regulate all the major areas of social life suggesting functioning principles which are most likely to work for everybody's benefit. It is worth mentioning that besides the strongly philosophical and ethical dimension of the principles, they are supposed to be rather pragmatic in the organizing of social life. (Weiming, 38)

Nowadays Confucianism is believed to be one of the elements which positively impact the economic and financial development of Korea. It is obvious that factors such as orderliness and hierarchical order, which contribute to the fact that people work hard and have pro-active attitudes, are associated to the Confucian principles. (Peterson, 149) the five relationships refer to the expectations that one must have from his peers based on the relation who defines them.

These behavioral expectations are actually loyalty and justice, love and filiality, initiative and obedience, brotherly love and respect and mutual faith. One can notice that they involve the duties from both parties involved in the relationship. The whole picture could be described as a sort of social contract and it is interesting to see what kind of impact this has upon the contemporary Korean society, especially the South one.

An interesting aspect which could be taken as a subject of analysis is represented by the challenges that an American professor teaching in Korea might be faced with. It is obvious that the Americans think in terms of abstract laws, whereas the Koreans are tempted to evaluate relations and relationships in more personal terms. School is a place belonging to the public sphere and the relations which are established here, especially between parties with different types of authority are tricky.

If a teacher and a student establish a relation with a strong personal dimension, then this dimension is likely to regulate a great part of the relation. This is against the reality to which the American is accustomed in which a profession is to be guided by certain principles only. If the American teacher refuses to install informal relationships with the students, this may result in the impossibility of genuine communication, which would further block the efficiency of the teacher's task. This means that the American teacher must find a way to gain the trust of the Korean student and at the same time try to maintain the standards imposed by the professional imperatives taught by his own cultural paradigm.( Kim, 40)

A further aspect of great interest in today's South Korean society is represented by the relationship between husband and wife. It must be mentioned that behind the rules of behavior, the real picture has the woman seen as passive and submissive part, while the man is considered to be active and dominant. The relationship is defined not in terms of feelings, but in terms of duties. The efficient functioning of the relationship is based upon the proper division of tasks. Under the circumstances in which the position of the spouses is not one of equality, but one party dominates the other who is supposed to obey, it is obvious that this latter part is likely to feel resentful at some point. Authors such as Oak suggest that the strong process of Westernization which has taken place in South Korea creates tension within the couple. The media campaigns which are promoting a female figure who is independent and who deserves a role which is equal to that of the male have had an important impact upon the mentality of South Korean women and this challenges this specific Confucian principle. (Elizabeth, 1)

A further type of relationship that might create challenges for the involved parties is represented by the partnership between a Korean and an American in terms of business. When a business relationship is established, the Korean party is tempted to view it as a partnership. This type of relationship is likely to fall under the behavioral expectations which exist in the brother-brother category. Under these circumstances, the fundamental coordinate becomes faith. Faith implies trusting the other party and acting accordingly. This is quite difficult to do especially for someone coming from the Western tradition, who is extremely business oriented and suspicious about everything.

An American partner might want to concentrate more on business issues and formal procedures. The Korean party on the other hand might favor the construction of a real relationship. These differences of approach might render trust between parties a severely challenged aspect and it is known that good business is hardly possible in the absence of trust. At this point one might state that while the Confucian principles have demonstrated to be efficient for the country in the past, in the conditions in which South Koreans need to be dealing more and more with foreign parties coming to the country, they are likely to transform in challenges nowadays.