Gwangju 5-18 and the Future of Global Democracy
he following article based on the accepting Speech for the 2016 Kim Dae Jung Scholar’s Prize for Democracy, Peace, and Human Rights, Chonnam National University, Gwangju, South Korea, June 8, 2016.
The Gwangju Uprising, alternatively called May 18 Democratic Uprising in Korea ( File Photo)-Ferdinand Marcos, Former President of the Philippines ( File Photo)
by George Katsiaficas
( June 8, 2016, Seoul , Sri Lanka Guardian) CNU has been my home away from home since 2001. I feel greatly honoured that my scholarly work has been recognized for helping to realize democracy, peace and human rights on the Korean peninsula. Ever since my first visit to Gwangju in 1999, I have felt myself to be at home. During my visit the next year, I was happily surprised by an invitation to meet President Kim Dae Jung shortly before his visit to Pyongyang.
George Katsiaficas
In this world, money rules, and scholarly endeavors are seldom recognized, let alone rewarded. My everyday experiences at CNU have been continual sources of surprise, happily so, and this award is part of that pattern. I recall another such incident that I would like to share with you. Some years ago, a German colleague was invited to Gwangju for the annual 518 Institute conference. As I showed him around campus, we happened upon the statue of 최상채 총장, Choi Sang-jae, the first president of CNU. My colleague laughed heartily as soon as he saw the statue of a man holding a book and wearing a modern western suit. So accustomed was he to see statues of men on horses with military regalia and weapons, that to him, the sight of a man with a book was a funny and exotic sight. I immediately challenged his laughter, and he quickly agreed that the portrayal of a scholar was a much better sight that any glorification of war. I am proud to consider myself a scholar from CNU.
Of the many professors here who have guided and accompanied me as I journeyed through the experiences of 518 and Korea’s minjung movement, I must name two: Na Kahn-chae, whose own work on the Gwangju Uprising has expanded our understanding through his insight that it was at least a 17-year project. Professor Na has been an indispensable intellectual colleague as well as a good friend. Together we edited an anthology about 518 published by Routledge. Prof. Park Hae-Kwang, current director of the 518 Institute, has nurtured our friendship in Boston and Gwangju and encouraged me intellectually and personally.
I first came to Korea in 1999 after my book on 1968 was translated. It quickly sold through more than 5 printings, and the publisher brought me to Seoul, where multiple interviews and reviews afforded me access to Korean public opinion. My wish ever since 1980, however, when I had seen news reports on 518 while living in Germany, was to visit Gwangju, and I did so in 1999 for one night—enough to fall in love with the city.
My book on the global imagination of 1968, 신좌파의 상상력, showed how internationalism and self-management were the twin aspirations that united a global New Left. From Czechoslovakia (invaded by the Soviet Union) to Vietnam (invaded by the US) to Paris, New York and Mexico City, the grassroots movements were practically and intuitively tied together even though no organization united them. I developed the concept of the eros effect to explain how this unity emerged in the absence of organization and extensive personal contact. In my second book (translated into Korean as정치의 전복), The Subversion of Politics: European Autonomous Social Movements and the Decolonization of Everyday Life, I illustrated how “consciously spontaneous” movements in Europe challenged contemporary norms and values while integrating categories of existence often thought to be mutually exclusive: eros and politics; opposing the government and working for justice; breaking the law and acting properly; and being in solidarity with the Third World rather than enjoying their exploitation.
