03.05.2017 - 09:28

Research Forum Lecture by Misook Lee

Transnational Communicative Networks in South Korea’s Democratization Movement …  |  Wed, May 3rd, 2017, 16–18 h  |  Room LE 736, Forsthausweg, Campus Duisburg

Abstract
Transnational Communicative Networks in South Korea’s Democratization Movement in the 1970s and 80s: focusing on the Japan-Korea Solidarity Movement
Transnational network studies in international relations, sociology, and history have grown rapidly since the 1990s. Research often tends to take a top-down (North-South) approach in which developed countries or international non-governmental organizations (INGOs) are assumed to “help” the developing ones. However, this one-way approach cannot fully explain the dynamics of transnational activist networks. This presentation aims to better understand such dynamics by focusing on the ‘communicative interaction’ among transnational actors of the “Japan-Korea Solidarity Movement,” formed by Korean residents in Japan (Zainichi) and progressive Japanese intellectuals, Christians, and activists to support South Korea’s democratization movement in the 1970s and 80s. In addition, this research examines the meaning and political implications of forming transnational networks with struggling others; transnational networks can work reflexively by problematizing the structural relationships among differently situated actors.