Abstract
In August 2012, Armed Forces & Society published an article by Insoo Kim, “Intra-military Divisions and Democratization in South Korea.” Uk Heo and Seongyi Yun refuted Kim's argument in their Disputatio Sine Fine response, “Another View on the Relationship between Democratization and Intra-Military Division in South Korea,“ published in April 2013. In the article, Heo and Yun argued that there was no clear sign of schism in the South Korea military and economic development substantially produced favorable condition for democratization in South Korea. Kim, by contrast, maintains that that the effect of intra-military division on political transition should be incorporated into the explanation of democratization in South Korea because Heo and Yun do not justify their claim that there was no clear evidence of schism in the South Korean military.
This is a response to Heo and Yun’s critique of my article recently published in Armed Forces & Society, in which I argue that the effect of military organizational structure on political transition should be incorporated into the explanations of democratization in South Korea because the disintegration of military cohesion ultimately reduces the regime’s capacity to block the transition to democracy. 1 Heo and Yun disagree in two points with my argument. 2 First, there is no clear sign of schism in the military. Second, economic development substantially produced favorable condition for democratization. While their view of democratization in South Korea might be justified, their economy-centered approach has two flaws. First, the authors do not justify their claim that there is no clear evidence of schism in the military. Second, their argument is weakened by their inability to suggest a social theory to better understand the difference between the successful military coup of 1979 and the successful democratization of 1987: the authors highlight that the military coup of 1979 should be understood as an exception that social scientists do not need to explain. In the following, I will address both issues.
Evidences of Schism in the Military in the 1980s
Heo and Yun interpret the fact that President Chun Doo-hwan appointed his men to key posts (Defense Security Command and Capital Garrison) in the military and enjoyed their loyalty throughout his tenure as evidence of a high degree of intra-military cohesion. In this regard, it is worth noting that President Chun’s military reshuffling is an exemplary case of Huntington’s subjective control that divides the military internally to weaken its political capacity. According to Huntington, “the power of the military may be reduced by breaking the officer corps up into competing units, establishing party armies and special military forces, infiltrating the military hierarchy with independent chain of command, and similar technique.” 3
In order to make this point clear, it is meaningful to note that President Park Chung-hee also appointed a small group of Korea Military Academy (KMA) graduates, called Hana faction, to the commander position in Blue House (presidential residence), Korean Central Intelligence Agency, and Defense Security Command in his tenure. 4 President Park’s favoritism was efficient enough to bind South Korean military together. However, a power struggle emerged within the military itself with finger pointing about flawed military reshuffling biased in favor of Hana faction. After President Park’s assassination on October 26, 1979, the Chief of Staff General Jeong Seung-hwa attempted to offset the influence of the Hana faction leader General Chun Doo-hwan. In response to this, on December 12, 1979, General Chun raised a mutiny against General Jeong with the support of his fellow Hana faction members. Therefore, it is necessary to ask if President Chun’s favoritism could promote intra-military cohesion rather than dissolving it.
As the successful military coup of 1979 resulted in the ascension of the Hana faction into the army leadership, President Chun’s political power rested not on the military-as-institution but on the Hana faction. 5 Therefore, no visible challenge to President Chun through his tenure can be construed as the result of his divide and conquer strategy used by his predecessor President Park. In my article published in this journal, I provided clear evidence that Hana faction members received preferential treatment for promotion and assignment, producing grievances among non-Hana faction KMA graduates against discriminatory military reshuffling. 6 Simply arguing that South Korean military enjoyed a high degree of intra-military cohesion, Heo and Yun fail to explain how President Chun could retain the support of military officers who are on the losing end of a highly politicized system of military reshuffling biased in favor of the Hana faction.
According to Bourdieu, “the university field is the locus of a struggle to determine the conditions and the criteria of legitimate membership and legitimate hierarchy, that is, to determine which properties are pertinent, effective and liable to function as a capital so as to generate the specific profit guaranteed by the field.” 7 A similar dynamic appears in the military field as well. Unless the majority of officers uphold the standards introduced by the government, the government’s influence over the establishment of standards for promotion and assignment can potentially become a form of favoritism. Officers do not passively accept standards that affect their opportunities for promotion and assignment. 8 Assuming that South Korean military officers are no more than a puppet of several key generals favored by President Chun, Heo and Yun turn a blind eye to the fact that marginalized officers often attempt to subvert existing standards that have been distorted as a result of their politicization when confronted with political crisis.
Military-centered Approach to Political Transition
After President Park’s assassination in 1979, Prime Minister Choi Kyu-ha lifted the ban on criticism against President Park’s martial law regime. By March 1980, professors and students expelled for anti-martial law activities returned to their universities. This gave hope for democracy and resulted in a massive demonstration often referred to as the Spring of Seoul in 1980. On May 16, 1980, over 100,000 protestors participated in anti-martial law demonstrations at Seoul Station. In response to this, General Chun assumed the state power, oppressing demand for democracy by force. In 1987, however, when a surge of popular uprising came again, President Chun accepted demands for democracy. Scholars who want to provide a better understanding of South Korea’s democratization thus must be able to answer the question of why President Chun acquiesced to the demand for democracy in 1987 but did not so in 1980.
If we follow the logic of Heo and Yun, who argue that the positive effect of economic development alone can explain democratization in South Korea, South Korean society reached to the level of economic development favorable for transition to democracy in 1987, while South Korea’s economic development was not enough to prevent General Chun from assuming state power in 1980. Then, it is necessary to ask what extent economic development has to be achieved in South Korea to create condition favorable for democracy and if the economic development was below this level in 1980. Huntington’s theory is useful to give an answer to these questions, failing to predict General Chun’s military mutiny of 1979 and his assumption of state power in 1980 with relatively high level of economic development at that period of time. 9 Therefore, a challenge of social scientists is to find an explanatory factor that explains variation between 1980 and 1987, rather than simply dropping the political upheaval between 1979 and 1980 as an exception for Huntington’s claim.
I wish to remind Heo and Yun of my argument that the military’s coercive capacity, which might influence an authoritarian ruler’s decision making against transition to democracy, can fluctuate independently of economic development, but dependently of intra-military division. In 1979, President Chun and the Hana faction could exploit the resentment that their KMA classmates felt due to the military reshuffling biased against them. The KMA graduates entered the military academy and got commissioned after a four-year education, while officers trained at other military schools entered the military school and got commissioned in the same year. When KMA graduates got commissioned as second lieutenants, other officers who entered the military school in the same year would already reach the rank of captain or major. 10 The South Korean Army Headquarters, made up mostly of non-KMA graduates, considered this delayed promotion legitimate and did not take any measure to reform the practice. 11 This situation provided General Chun and Hana faction members with distinct advantage in the conflict against the Army Headquarters on December 12, 1979. As the KMA graduates other than Hana faction members were mostly appointed in the middle-range positions in the military hierarchy and refused to engage in their classmates, the formal chain of command headed by the Army Headquarters dissolved. 12
In the 1980s, however, the situation changed radically for two reasons. First, the highly politicized system of military reshuffling biased in favor of Hana faction eroded the camaraderie among the KMA graduates. Second, military officers except Hana faction had nothing to gain from President Chun’s authoritarian rule. Under President Chun’s rule in the 1980s, the subjective social class position of military personnel was below the national average. Controlling for college education, only 27 percent of military officers chose high or high-middle class, as compared to 52 percent of civilian respondents. 13 Therefore, it is meaningful to ask what if President Chun called the troops into the streets to quell the demonstrations. My answer to this question comes from a classic wisdom that “a rebellion cannot succeed in direct confrontation against the armed forces of the status quo government so long as these are not prevented by political or other reasons from realizing their full potential” 14 and Saxer who argues that in 1987 “they (the military) were in position to reject any government order to mobilize and suppress the demonstrations by force.” 15
Conclusion
What I argue in my original article is that the positive effect of economic development alone cannot explain President Chun’s decision making for transition to democracy in 1987. At this point, I refute Heo and Yun’s arguments in their critique that “there were no significant divisions in the military or other challenges to the Chun administration, and changing the presidential election system was based on the political calculations of Chun Doo-hwan and Roh Tae-woo” 16 for two reasons. First, the coercive capacity of the military, which is determined by intra-military divisions, 17 is a critical factor that might influence an authoritarian ruler’s decision for or against initiating the transition to democracy. 18 I do not find any theoretical discussion in their critique to refute the argument of previous literature that “a new factional split inside the military occurred which became obvious in the summer of 1987.” 19 Second, Heo and Yun’s explanations on South Korea’s transition to democracy rely much on President Chun’s personal concern over heavy US pressure and political scheming rather than South Korea’s economic development. Weighting much to the political calculations other than economic development for themselves, they had no relevant reason to let intra-military division, supported by empirical results, dropped from the list of plausible explanatory variables for South Korea’s democratization.
Footnotes
Authors’ Note
The views expressed here are the opinions of the author and as such do not represent the official positions of the South Korean military.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.