Korean Job Discussion Forums

Real Reality · Joined: 10 Jan 2003 Location: Seoul

More Students Become Conservative
Sixty-six percent of Korean college students do not support socialist ideas and advocate a market-oriented economy, according to a survey....professor of the department of psychology at Yonsei University,...survey looking at the school's 131 students and their 122 parents to measure the level of their ideological tendencies.
By Chung Ah-young, Korea Times
http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/nation/200512/kt2005120517482010510.htm

Tiger Beer · Joined: 07 Feb 2003

One of my students wrote a paper about how he's disappointed the US military are going to have a much lesser presence on the ROK. Many of the other students seemed to agree based on the argument.

1) Costs Korea A LOT OF MONEY to be protecting itself.
2) The anti-American incidents now seem trivial based on how much they benefit from the US military.
3) The local enonomy of businesses which benefit from their presense, etc.
4) US/Korea relations
5) The strong relation with the US, helps keep China/Japan from any imperalistic yearnings if it came to that for some reason in the future (keep in mind these are all Korean students perspectives - I thought the last one was a bit unrealistic).

I found the whole thing interesting coming from Korean university students.. wouldn't have heard any of those things prior to shrinking the US military presense on the ROK.

Hater Depot · Joined: 29 Mar 2005

I hope this means they'll be less anti-American as well. The pendulum can swing back unexpectedly too.

jaganath69 · Joined: 17 Jul 2003

What's so conservative about being pro-market? I'm that way inclined and also in favour of the very radical notion that people can make decisions for themselves better than government can. Politics is about more than just your economic beliefs.

RACETRAITOR · Joined: 24 Oct 2005 Location: Seoul, South Korea

Homer · Guest

RR is it more students become conservative or more conservatives become students? Laughing

Which is first? hmmmm... Question

RACETRAITOR · Joined: 24 Oct 2005 Location: Seoul, South Korea

You know, when you flip the statistic and say "33% of Korean students advocate socialism," that's a little freaky, isn't it? I doubt it's even that high in Canada.

Obviously the writer is one of those Bushite morons who sees it as "There's two different sides: you've got your neo-conservatives in one, and you've got your liberals, communists, socialists, Democrats, social democrats, Marxists, Marxist-Leninists, Trotskyists, monarchists, anarchists, and everyone else in the other."

Bee Positive · Joined: 27 Oct 2005

Ya-ta Boy · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: Established in 1994

Since only 131 students were polled, I would be inclined not to generalize too much from this report.

That being said, it's probably true. The Uri Party got in to power without having to spell out what its policies really mean. There was considerable dismay among young people when Roh said early in his term that the priority was to redistribute wealth rather than expand wealth. This did not sit well with all the unemployed university grads out there.

An independent foreign policy sounds nice but it may sound less attractive when you stop to figure out that money spent on new fighter planes means less money is available for highway construction.

China's claims on Koguryo and her easy success in forcing the garlic market open reminded many that China is not necessarily a more benevolent friend than the US.

RACETRAITOR · Joined: 24 Oct 2005 Location: Seoul, South Korea

Paji eh Wong · Joined: 03 Jun 2003