A research methodological debate on emancipatory catastrophism: The case of transnational marriage

This dialogue article offers a concrete case study demonstrating the empirical significance of the concepts of emancipatory catastrophism and metamorphosis by identifying their driving force as the push and pull factors which interact when a social transformation takes place. In his public lecture at the Seoul Conference Beck (2014) explained emancipatory catastrophism through three conceptual lenses – the violation of sacred norms of human existence, anthropological shock, and social catharsis. And his concept of metamorphosis is characterized as an ‘interlocked double process [which] can be imagined as a sociological equivalent to the double helix,’ something which is not a revolution or evolution, but a happening, still emerging.

The concepts of emancipatory catastrophism and metamorphosis, even though they are very enlightening and eye-opening, are neither sufficiently clear-cut nor systematic as an analytic explanatory scheme. They may well fit the case of Hurricane Katrina, but perhaps not the case of transnational marriage, of the focus of my analysis. Thus this article seeks to systematize the driving force of emancipatory catastrophism as consisting of push and pull factors and to apply this analytic scheme to the concrete case of transnational marriage which involves both the catastrophic push factor and an emancipatory pull factor for the ‘unmarriageable bachelors’ in rural Korea and the South Asian women who come and get married in Korea.

In the late 1980s to early 1990s there arose the social problem of rural bachelors in Korea who could not find a wife. When I searched the news portal ‘Naver’ with the term ‘suicide of rural bachelors,’ I found 72 news reports in four newspapers, Dong-A (26), Kyunghyang (20), Mael Economy (5), and Hankyereh (21). This may be quite high. According to a study on the Kanghwa-Gun area in Korea from 1979 to 1987, detailing suicide numbers based on a police investigation report (Hankyereh, 22 September 1988), the suicide rate for rural areas was 48.7 per 100,000 population, which was higher than 45.3 per 100,000 population in Hungary, the highest suicide rate in the world at that time. Of course the reasons for suicide vary. However, among those in their twenties the most prevalent reason (17.6%) was reported as the relationship with the spouse (including not being able to get married).

A brief look at the titles of the news reports shows the then reality of the rural bachelors’ situation. ‘A rural bachelor commits suicide, depressed about not being able to get married’ (Dong-A, 26 May 1989); ‘A rural bachelor burns himself to death, at continued refusal at arranged marriages’ (Dong-A, 23 August 1992); ‘A rural bachelor, shocked at the break of his engagement, commits suicide by jumping from a hotel’ (Dong-A, 11 January 1990); ‘A rural bachelor drinks agricultural pesticide and commits suicide, depressed about not being able to get married’ (Kyunghyang, 6 September 1988). We can analyze these through the three conceptual lenses Beck mentioned (2014). The situation of rural bachelors unable to get married indicates the violation of sacred norms of human existence, that is, to get married, have children, make a family, and support their parents, which is a filial piety in East Asian culture, and live happily.

Moreover, the apocalyptic catastrophe of their suicide gives us an anthropological shock. The situation of these rural bachelors became a social issue in Korea. People who read the news articles wanted to see an end to such sad and tragic stories. And various efforts were made and various measures were suggested. The rural bachelors themselves formed a match-making movement and established a committee for marriage arrangements (Kyunghyang, 26 June 1990). With this there also followed a number of campaigns to arrange marriages for these ‘unmarriageable’ rural bachelors. Others pointed out that there should be more fundamental measures going beyond the match- making, not only solving the uneven development and population drain of rural areas, but also improving the housing, environmental, and sanitary situations in rural areas. However, with the fast industrialization and urbanization, the gap between urban and rural areas became wider and all these efforts and measures proved not so successful. In this situation transnational marriage began to emerge as an alternative. The above can be considered the factors pushing the rural bachelors to transnational marriages.

This turn to transnational marriage could be an unintended, unseen emancipatory side effect of global risk, and could be understood as a social catharsis, or paradigm shift. The desperation turned into hope, and the bad turned into good things. Those in a bad situation turned into those in a good situation. This seems a very oriental way of thinking. There is an idiom derived from an ancient legend, called Saiwengzhima, ‘a horse of an old man at a frontier,’ which means that an evil may sometimes turn out to be a blessing in disguise. ¹ The ‘unmarriageable’ Korean rural bachelors who were at a disadvantage in the marriage market, could now get married, and could even enjoy a marriage with a young, exotic woman. A verse from the Gospel of St Matthew in the New Testament seems apt here, ‘Those who became later became earlier’ (19: 23–30).

Here a question arises. The first is: when and how does an emancipatory catastrophism arise? How serious should the violation of the sacred norms be and how serious should the anthropological shock be for an emancipatory catastrophism and for a transnational marriage to occur? There should be some kind of mechanism working here. Beck mentions global risk as push factors, but this does not seem to be enough. In order to explain the possibility of a choice of an individual, it seems that we need not only the structural-objective dimension pushing them, but also cultural-discursive dimension pulling them toward an action.

In the context of transnational marriage, we can point to pull factors at various levels. For example a local government began to arrange the transnational marriage of Korean rural bachelors to Korean-Chinese women from the northeast region of China. The Korean-Chinese women’s ancestors came from Korea, and thus they look similar to Koreans, could speak the Korean language, make and eat Korean food, have similar attitudes toward the family, and share Korean culture. This was quite successful, and the government made a special effort to support these transnational marriages for rural bachelors to overcome the reproduction crisis caused by the low marriage and low birth rates. Also marriage brokerage agencies emerged and grew. However, this was not enough. The rural bachelors themselves had to be willing to engage in transnational marriage. The concept of filial piety is something which changed their mind. With its strong patrilineal tradition, the idea of carrying on the family line is very important in Korea, particularly in rural Korea (Shim and Han, 2010). Those Korean bachelors who did not consider a transnational marriage as desirable slowly began to change their attitude. These could be considered as the factors pulling the rural bachelors to transnational marriages. And transnational marriages were extended to other regions of Asia, such as the Philippines, Vietnam, Thailand, Mongolia, Cambodia, etc.

The same can be said of the Southeast Asian women who chose transnational marriage with Korean men. Here I focus on Vietnamese women’s situation. In socialist Vietnam, which pursued a reform policy based on a liberal market economy since 1986, the situation of farmers and women got worse, with support to the cooperatives being stopped. Also there was no welfare and/or public security mechanism, even when they suffered severe damage to their houses due to natural disasters, such as flooding, particularly in the southern areas of the Mekong River, but had to find their own survival strategy (Kim, 2014: 45). In addition, the agricultural work still depended on hard manual labor, particularly by women, duties being passed on from mother to daughter. Thus young women realized their dire situation and began to dream of a better future. Another issue was the marriage culture. In rural Vietnam a daughter who is not married by 24 or 25 years of age is considered a ‘bomb you never know when it will explode’ (Shim et al., 2007: 38–39; se also Kim, 2014: 45). In this situation transnational marriage emerged as an alternative.

However, this is not enough. In order for an emancipatory catastrophism and metamorphosis to occur, there should also be pull factors. In this relation the concept of filial piety again is a good linking variable. Poor women in Vietnam used to live close by their parents’ home even after marriage, doing agricultural work together and doing their duties of filial piety. In Vietnam, the family is very important and women seldom left the family. However, with the emergence of transnational marriage the concept of filial piety began to change. There emerged visible changes such as the foreign husband building or buying a new house or land, providing funding to start a fish farm, and buying such symbols of modernity as a motorcycle or electronic home appliances. Thus the success myth through transnational marriage began to be reinforced. Transnational marriage began to be considered not only as something which could change a young woman’s future, but also a way to fulfill filial piety (Kim, 2014: 46–47). In addition, romantic love as depicted in the Korean dramas which are extremely popular in Vietnam due to the phenomenon of the ‘Korean wave,’ probably also inculcated desire for Korean men (Kim, 2014: 48; Shim and Han, 2010). Thus we can say that emancipatory catastrophism cannot occur when push factors alone exist, but rather when both the push and pull factors coexist and interact.

Beck argues that emancipatory catastrophism and metamorphosis can be seen neither as intentionally created nor as objectively determined but can work out a significant transformation only when several independent conditions are met. Mao characterizes this well in her comments in her own article in this issue. In particular, it is impressive that Beck attempts to show ‘how normative horizons as frames of perception and action emerge.’ In Korea, where public sentiment comes to the boil so instantly and cools down so quickly that they call it ‘public sentiment in a saucepan,’ a social issue is not sustained for a long time. Similar accidents repeat, and at first people are shocked and ask for change, but soon the fever cools down and people forget about it. Here arises another question: When does a metamorphosis succeed and when does it fail? What are the conditions for its success, that is, for a metamorphosis to occur? Is the failure due to the lack of political power or the lower severity of a catastrophe? Is it because the people did not learn enough or because people’s response cools down too quickly? An empirical analysis requires us to be more elaborate about the conditions and mechanisms such as the push and pull factors upon which emancipatory catastrophism and metamorphosis unfold successfully.