Multiculturalism In South Korea Essay

Multiculturalism in South Korean Society Koreans have always believed in a unique “Korean” identity, meaning they have a shared bloodline or a common ancestry. In the past, blood purity and ethnic homogeneity were core ideas of national identity, however as South Korea has become more modernized they are losing their ethnocentric ideal and instead have begun to refer to their country as, “the land of opportunity.”

To many South Koreans ethnicity is considered a cultural phenomenon with strong roots in their distinct language and history; therefore they consider themselves racially diverse from Chinese, Japanese and all other Asian cultures. When Japan attempted to assimilate Koreans this conception became even more important. The Japanese

However, as they began to notice a labor shortage for necessary jobs the country became partially-open to foreigners. Which also benefitted the shortage of “marriageable women,” due to the preference for male children throughout the 1970’s and 80’s, leading to frequent international marriages. The increase in bi-racial children increased the ethnic diversity of South Korea, bringing with it many positive but also negative outcomes. This emergence of a multi-ethnic society was not expected by the government, as they had only hired many of the foreigners as “temporary trainees” who were simply expected to relieve the labor shortages then leave. Since many of the temporary workers came from poor Asian and South Asian countries, even though they were not entitled to basic workers’ rights, they were paid more than they would be in their home country. Therefore, after their allotted time in South Korea they stayed and continued to work,

The government introduced the Labor Standards Law, which offered pension benefits and partial health insurance to foreign workers. Through this South Korea became one of the first Asian countries to provide rights for immigrant workers. But, they were designed primarily to support bi-racial families; families with one foreign parent, since such families continued to partially maintain the idea of one bloodline. The government continued to assist such families with the introduction of the “Multicultural Families Support Act” in 2008. The act introduced many important welfare benefits and universities were required to admit a designated number of bi-racial students, and people of half-Korean descent were now allowed to serve in the military. The South Korean government was strongly critiqued after introducing the act as they claimed to be accepting multi-culturalism, many saw it as an attempt to maintain the “homogeneity” of the country by demanding that immigrants could only join society through assimilation and not through coexistence of cultures. The government then began to create programs to increase the acceptance of their new “multicultural state,” in which the term “multicultural” also included native Koreans, to help foreigners gain a better understanding of Korean culture. They introduced Korean language and culture exposure programs, and held culture