Korean Prime minister’s message: For more diverse, inclusive society

2021/12/10 Leave a comment

Interesting signal given long-standing ethnic-based citizenship:

Greetings, beloved children. I’m Kim Boo-kyun, prime minister of the Republic of Korea.

You are receiving very special awards today.

Yang Geun-mo, Noh Yeon-kyeong, Jun Blessing, Lee Yu-rim, Wu Zhengxiu, Lee Jeong-in, Ban Jun-hwi, Jo Un-ol, Pak Olga, Han Ga-in and Pyo Yoon-seo ― I congratulate all of you 11 award winners.

I also congratulate and express gratitude to your parents and teachers who have led you as students to these achievements.

I also thank President-Publisher Oh Young-jin and staff at The Korea Times which has provided children with special and meaningful memories for the last 10 years.

On this happy day, I wish I could shake hands with you in person, and it is regretful that I can’t do so but instead send my message through this video because of the COVID-19 social distancing rules.

Dear children, Korea now has more than 1 million people from multicultural families. Korea has become an international society of diverse cultures and races. You are citizens of Korea and also citizens of the world.

Despite the changes, you still face many hardships in society. I learned some multicultural families had difficulties in responding to COVID-19 due to the language barrier in the early stages of the pandemic. I heard many students had problems in taking online classes.

We, the government, will make more efforts. We’ll take a closer look at such hardships, to create a social atmosphere where difference is respected and where all of you can benefit under the government’s policy on multiculturalism.

Thanks to you, the inclusivity and diversity of our society is growing. So each and every one of you are precious for society. The life of children from multicultural families, including you award winners, is a precious gift to society.

The awards you receive today are an expression of gratitude and respect from adults. It is okay for you to be happy and proud of yourselves.

Dear children, you are proud citizens of Korea. Please remember that your happiness is key to the happiness of the whole nation.

We hope you’ll grow with more confidence. The Korean government and society will do our best to support you. Congratulations again.

Kim Boo-kyum is the prime minister of the Republic of Korea.

Source: Prime minister’s message: For more diverse, inclusive society

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[Us and Them] I’m Korean, you’re not, and there’s a fine line you can’t cross

2021/09/23 Leave a comment

Of note:

Silas Harper Bray, a 30-year-old English teacher based in Gyeonggi Province, has never regretted marrying her Korean husband. But others weren’t so fond of her decision, and they weren’t shy about letting her know.

She has found out during her three-year stay in South Korea that some Koreans do not like the idea of “mixing blood,” and they made sure she got the message, no matter how offensive it might be.

“Many people have told my husband that he should have married a Korean,” Harper Bray told The Korea Herald. “Two people have told us that if we had kids they would be ‘mongrels’ and to take them out of Korea as they will never be Korean.”

Most people may not care about foreigners marrying Koreans, but Harper Bray sensed that racism is a reality in Korea, and she learned that the ideology of homogeneity definitely had a role in it.

What Harper Bray learned goes back to how many South Koreans have erroneously taken pride in Korea being ethnically homogeneous. This has given reason for Koreans to treat those of other ethnicities differently and effectively bar them from identifying themselves as Koreans.

And that is slowly eating away at Korea’s reputation built with cultural heritage and economic success, as foreigners are left out and ostracized, told there’s no room for them at the party.

The country has been rapidly transforming with its demographic landscape becoming more colorful than ever before. With its socioeconomic and cultural appeal, Korea has become a destination of choice for many immigrants.

However, much more is needed for the country and its people to truly accept newcomers, experts say, especially when many Koreans still believe today that they live in a single-race nation, which must be protected to preserve its identity and sacredness.

More than 2.3 million foreigners were reported to be in Korea as of late last year, but the notion of Korea being a single-race nation remains alive today, expressed through stereotypes and discriminatory actions against immigrants.

“My grandmother always says that white, Black or whoever other than Koreans aren’t Koreans and can never be one, as they belong to places other than here by blood,” recalled Lee Jin-ho, a 30-year-old who said his grandparents maintained a tight boundary of who can and can’t be a Korean.

“She went full-on rage mode when she learned that my brother was dating a white American. She threatened to oust him from the family and whatever, and he had to give up. It was intense back then.”

Experts say such belief in homogeneity, a belief that Korea was born to life exclusively by the work of ethnic Koreans and no one else, is largely unfounded.

Many research projects in recent years have debunked the myth, showing how Koreans today are the result of massive mixtures from war, migration and travel, but the belief remained strong enough to be taught at home and in schools.

According to a report from local genome analysis firm Clinomics released in 2020, Koreans are a group of diverse ethnic backgrounds, best explained by the mix of the Neolithic Devil’s Gate genome in Russia and the Iron Age Vat Komnou in Southeast Asia.

Researchers said Koreans are likely to be the result of large population expansion and mixture that occurred throughout East Asia, rather than a unique isolated group that came into being from unitary migration.

“We speculate that this admixing trend initially occurred mostly outside the Korean Peninsula followed by continuous spread and localization in Korea, corresponding with the general admixture trend of East Asia,” the report said.

“Over 70 percent of extant Korean genetic diversity is said to be derived from a recent population expansion and admixture from the South.”

Yet historians and ethnic studies scholars say scientific backgrounds are not what has formed today‘s belief of homogeneity and the strict definition of “Korean-ness.”

“This concept of ethnic homogeneity that we still emphasize today was born rather recently,” said Shin Gi-wook, a sociology professor at Stanford University who is an expert on Korea’s demographics.

“This kind of idea didn’t exist in Joseon Dynasty, and it hasn’t been that long since Korean became a national language. Discussions on the identity of those in the Korean Peninsula only started in late 19th century, but still that wasn’t about ethnic homogeneity or anything.”

Shin says the nationalist belief dates back to the Japanese occupation in the early 20th century, when Koreans emphasized their own identity in distinguishing themselves from the Japanese.

Countering Japan’s objective to unite Asians from different countries under its colonial empire, Koreans preferred to categorize themselves as a different ethnicity, a tendency that peaked in the 1920s and ’30s.

The ideology grew again under the Park Chung-hee administration in the 1960s and ‘70s, which promoted modernization coupled with national awareness in strengthening the nation with everyone working as a single organism.

While Park’s dictatorship ended and democratization sped up, the ideological unity mostly remained. It has continued to today and served as a blockade between conservative ethnic Koreans and those who do not look like them.

“South Korea divides people into insiders and outsiders, and there is no concept of minority in their minds,” Shin added.

“Reality is that Korea is not so much a livable country for foreigners. They are categorized as outsiders, and they are never truly welcomed as valued members of the society even though Korea wants to be viewed as a country that is desired to be visited from elsewhere.”

Even though the country has been promoting multiculturalism as a policy initiative since 2006, Korea has not been very inclusive. Instead, newcomers are asked to assimilate into Korean culture and society on their own.

And even then, Koreans do not always consider those who have worked to assimilate as part of Korean society, believing they will leave soon or give birth to “mongrels,” as Harper Bray described.

This has also made Koreans take the problem of racism lightly, Shin says, believing the issue is more relatable to other diverse nations like the US and other countries in the West.

“We tend to examine cases of racial discrimination against ethnic Koreans in countries like the United States, but we don‘t really spend much time reviewing such cases in Korea,” he said.

“This is a sign that people take this issue of racism less seriously in Korea.”

Source: [Us and Them] I’m Korean, you’re not, and there’s a fine line you can’t cross

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Seoul court rejects slave labor claim against Japanese firms

2021/06/08 Leave a comment

Of note:

South Korean court on Monday rejected a claim by dozens of World War II-era Korean factory workers and their relatives who sought compensation from 16 Japanese companies for their slave labor during Japan’s colonial occupation of Korea.

The decision by the Seoul Central District Court appeared to run against landmark Supreme Court rulings in 2018 that ordered Nippon Steel and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to compensate Korean forced laborers.

It largely aligns with the position maintained by the Japanese government, which insists all wartime compensation issues were settled under a 1965 treaty normalizing relations between the two nations that was accompanied by hundreds of millions of dollars in economic aid and loans from Tokyo to Seoul.

A total of 85 plaintiffs had sought a combined 8.6 billion won ($7.7 million) in damages from 16 Japanese companies, including Nippon Steel, Nissan Chemical and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.

The court dismissed their civil lawsuit after concluding the 1965 treaty doesn’t allow South Korean citizens to pursue legal action against the Japanese government or citizens over wartime grievances. Accepting the plaintiffs’ claim would violate international legal principles that countries cannot use domestic law as justification for failures to perform a treaty, the court said.

Some plaintiffs told reporters outside the court they planned to appeal. An emotional Lim Chul-ho, 85, the son of a deceased forced laborer, said the court made a “pathetic” decision that should have never happened.

“Are they really South Korean judges? Is this really a South Korean court?” he asked. “We don’t need a country or government that doesn’t protect its own people.”

It wasn’t immediately clear how the ruling would affect diplomacy between the estranged U.S. allies, which have faced pressure from the Biden administration to repair relations that sank to postwar lows during the Trump years over history and trade disputes.

South Korea’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it respects the decisions by domestic courts and is willing to engage in talks with Tokyo to find “rational” solutions that can satisfy both governments and the wartime victims.

Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said Tokyo was carefully watching the developments in South Korea and hoping that Seoul would take a responsible action to improve ties. He said bilateral relations were still in a “severe condition” because of issues related to Korean forced laborers and wartime sex slaves.

“We believe it is important for South Korea to act responsibly to resolve the outstanding problems between the two countries and we will be watching concrete proposals by the South Korean side aimed at resolving the problems,” Kato said at a news briefing.

The plaintiffs had said the workers endured harsh conditions that caused “extreme” mental and physical pain that prevented them from resuming normal lives after they returned home at the end of the war.

The Seoul court said in its ruling that it had to consider that forcing Japanese companies to compensate the victims would cause significant “adverse reactions” for South Korea internationally.

“A forcible execution (of compensation) would violate the large constitutional principles of ensuring the safety of the country and maintaining order, and would constitute an abuse of power,” the court said, describing its ruling as an “inevitable” decision.

In April, the court issued a similar ruling on a claim by Korean victims of Japanese wartime sexual slavery and their relatives, another sticking point in bilateral relations. In that ruling, the court denied their claim for compensation from Japan’s government, citing diplomatic considerations and principles of international law that grant countries immunity from the jurisdiction of foreign courts.

Relations between Seoul and Tokyo have been strained since South Korea’s Supreme Court in 2018 ordered Nippon Steel and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to compensate Korean forced laborers. Those rulings led to further tensions over trade when Japan placed export controls on chemicals vital to South Korea’s semiconductor industry in 2019.

Seoul accused Tokyo of weaponizing trade and threatened to terminate a military intelligence-sharing agreement with Tokyo that was a major symbol of their three-way security cooperation with Washington. South Korea eventually backed off and continued the deal after being pressured by the Trump administration, which until then seemed content to let its allies escalate their feud in public.

South Korea’s tone on Japan has softened since the inauguration of U.S. President Joe Biden, who has been stepping up efforts to bolster three-way cooperation among the countries that declined under Donald Trump’s “America first” approach, to coordinate action in the face of China’s growing influence and North Korea’s nuclear threat.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in in a nationally televised speech in March said his government was eager to build “future-oriented” ties with Japan and that the countries should not allow their wartime past to hold them back.

Source: Seoul court rejects slave labor claim against Japanese firms

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Korean citizenship may soon be more attainable for foreign children

2021/04/28 Leave a comment

Marginal change, given requirement for “deep ties”, with priority given to those whose families have been in Korea for two generations:

The underage children of foreigners with permanent residency in Korea may soon be able to acquire Korean citizenship under a revision to the nationality law proposed by the Ministry of Justice on Monday.

Generally, the acquisition of Korean nationality follows the principle of jus sanguinis, and ethnic Koreans are able to more easily attain Korean citizenship.

However, the Ministry of Justice’s proposed revision to the Nationality Act will introduce a “simple nationality acquisition policy for young children born in Korea to permanent residents.” Under the revised law, if a permanent resident with “deep ties” to Korea gives birth to a child in Korea, the child will become a citizen by simply reporting his or her intent to acquire Korean nationality to the Minister of Justice.

Previously, children born in Korea to permanent residents had to apply for naturalization, even if they completed their primary and secondary education in the country.

Although the revision does not signal a complete abandonment of the jus sanguinis principle, it would make it significantly easier for minors to become Korean citizens earlier in their youth.

If the revision passes, children 6 years old or younger would be able to report an intent to naturalize without any additional requirements. Children who are 7 or older can do the same, provided they have resided in the country five or more years.

However, not all children born on Korean soil to permanent residents can naturalize with ease under the policy. Priority will be given to those children whose families have been in Korea for two or more generations and permanent residents who have “deep blood or cultural ties” to the country.

One of the main beneficiaries of the law will be ethnic Chinese who have resided in Korea for several decades but were barred from citizenship under the strict application of the jus sanguinis principle.

According to government estimates, about 3,900 individuals are currently eligible to acquire Korean nationality under the revised scheme. The Ministry of Justice believes that 600 to 700 additional people will be eligible every year.

“By giving children of permanent residents with deep ties to Korean society an opportunity to acquire nationality early, [the policy] will help foster their cultural identity and establish stability,” the Justice Ministry said. “It will also contribute to secure growth in the labor pool in the era of low birth rates and an aging population.”

Source: Korean citizenship may soon be more attainable for foreign children

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Changing immigration trends colour ‘Minari’ reception in South Korea

2021/04/24 Leave a comment

Of interest:

The heartfelt Korean immigrant tale in “Minari” resonated with many Asian Americans, but for some in South Korea the film presented a far too dated view of immigration to the United States.

“Minari”, directed by a Korean-American and produced in the United States, was nominated for six Academy Awards, including best picture, best director and best supporting actress for Youn Yuh-jung, a historic first for a Korean actor.

Released in the midst of the pandemic, the film’s Korean elements and its Oscar nominations helped make it a commercial success in South Korea, where the film brought in $7 million of its total $11 million global box office receipts, compared with $2 million from showings in the United States, according to IMDb.

In “Minari,” the tale of a hard-luck immigrant farming family in rural Arkansas in the 1980s highlighted the heyday of immigration from South Korea to the United States. Today, however, it’s a tale that is increasingly foreign to many South Koreans, especially younger people.

“It is true that people are less interested in ‘Minari’ because of its topic, as these days it’s mostly rich people who immigrate to America,” said a 35-year-old teacher who only gave her surname, Jeong.

About 350,000 Koreans were estimated to have immigrated to the United States in the 1980s after the liberalisation of overseas travel and studies. The annual tally peaked in 1986, at 30,500, but it slowed to 8,000 a year in the 2000s, and then to about 4,000 after Washington tightened border controls after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, according to South Korea’s foreign ministry.

Most new Korean immigrants to the United States are there for jobs or satisfy an investment requirement of nearly a million dollars, the ministry data showed.

Racial tensions, highlighted by a recent Atlanta shooting in which four Koreans were killed, and the high numbers of coronavirus cases and deaths in the United States, have also cast a darker shadow on the idea of living there, said Park Soo-hui, 69, who said she has relatives in the United States.

Park said the film reminded of the hardships her relatives suffered after moving to the United States in the early 1990s. But her teenage granddaughter had a different thought.

“They left hoping for a better life as they were not doing well here, and they went through a lot in their early days, including racial discrimination and family disputes,” she said. “But as we watched the film together, my granddaughter was just envious, saying not everyone could go there.”

“Minari” is the second film in as many years to make history at the Academy Awards with its Korean connections, after the South Korea-produced “Parasite” took the 2020 awards by storm, snagging six nominations and four wins, including “Best Picture.”

It attracted more than 10 million viewers in South Korean theatres within two months of its release in 2019, becoming one of the most watched films in Korean history.

“Minari,” which opened in South Korea on March 3, has drawn about 925,000 viewers as of Wednesday, Korean Film Council (KOFIC) data showed.

More than “Minari” itself, South Koreans expressed more interest in the nomination for Youn, who plays a spunky grandmother who travels to the United States to take care of her grandchildren.

Jung Duk-hyun, a culture critic, said the domestic audience could be more focused on Youn because she not only earned the Oscar nomination but also embodied an “independent, mischievous and cool grandma,” an image of women increasingly pursued in Korean society.

Source: Changing immigration trends colour ‘Minari’ reception in South Korea

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Korea urged to fix immigration policies

2021/01/06 Leave a comment

One of an ongoing series of articles on Korean immigration policies or lack thereof, along with changing demographics:

In recent decades, South Korea has emerged as a global economic powerhouse and become a core member of the international community. Leading the transformation have been many Korean individuals and companies who have written success stories in different parts of the world.

Joining the league of advanced countries, the country has strengthened its overseas presence and raised its global profile both economically by expanding exports and diplomatically by increasing its donations to developing nations.

However, despite its successful ascension to the world stage, Korea is considered neither internationalized nor inclusive. Society here is still insular, failing to embrace different cultures, races and nationalities.

Such closed-mindedness is preventing Asia’s fourth-largest economy from moving forward, as the country is facing grave demographic challenges ― an aging population, a low birthrate and a declining workforce.

In this regard, creating an “inclusive society” to bridge the gap between Koreans and non-Koreans should be at the top of the agenda for the Moon Jae-in administration in 2021, to ensure sustainable growth and future prosperity for the country.

Reforming immigration policies

As Korea enters 2021 with its looming demographic crisis, attracting young, skilled immigrants through an open migration policy may be one of the key strategies to address the sharp decline in the population.

According to the Ministry of Justice, the number of foreign nationals staying in the country for more than three months was around 1.73 million as of December 2019 ― adding in short-term visitors, and the estimated number hit a record high of 2.52 million.

The number has been increasing almost annually from the 1.89 million tallied in 2015. With the stagnating native Korean population growth, the ratio of foreign nationals among the nation’s total population has also grown from 3.6 percent that year to 4.8 percent in 2019.

The Statistics Korea forecast in 2019 predicted that people with migrant backgrounds ― foreigners, naturalized Koreans, and second generation migrants ― are expected to account for more than 5 percent of the total population in 2024, which will constitute a “multicultural, multiracial society” according to OECD standards.

It is expected that foreign nationals will continue to play a more important part in Korean society, which means the country should lay the groundwork for inclusivity through detailed immigration policies.

These are important as they not only guide migrants’ integration into the economic, social, cultural and political spheres of society, but also shape how the native population perceives migrants and immigration.

Foreign residents and members of multicultural families living in the country shared with The Korea Times their thoughts on current immigration policies and what improvements the country needs to make in 2021.

“The biggest problem with the current immigration policies is that they are scattered across several ministries. The government needs a control tower to formulate integrated plans,” said Jasmine Lee, chairwoman of the Korea Cultural Diversity Organization.

Naturalized in Korea, Lee from the Philippines also pointed out that the country does not even have a legal definition of an immigrant.

Currently, the Ministry of Justice manages visa applications and foreign entry, while the Ministry of Employment and Labor monitors and regulates migrant workers who enter the country under the Employment Permit System (EPS), and the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family runs policies related to marriage migrants and their families.

The former lawmaker viewed that the absence of a high-level government body in charge of drafting a framework is the main reason why the country is failing to implement coherent immigration policies.

Much of the policies are focused on inviting low-skilled workers for temporary stays, and encouraging international marriage without giving sufficient opportunities for marriage migrants to fully adapt to society, she said.

“Most importantly, for an inclusive society, support measures for migrants should be drawn up not out of sympathy toward them, but based on the idea that they are equal members of our society,” she said.

Lee stated that among the bills currently being discussed at the National Assembly, the legislation of the Anti-Discrimination Law will be a start in providing equal rights to all foreign residents and eradicating prejudice against them.

‘Foreign workers are backbone of Korea’s economy’

Shekh al Mamun, a senior member of a migrant workers’ union under the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions, said the government’s low level of awareness on equality during the COVID-19 pandemic has disappointed many foreign workers, who were discriminated against in the administration’s mask distribution plan as well as the disaster relief funding programs.

He stressed that the policies for migrant workers, who mainly work in factories and farms in rural areas, should be based on the recognition that they are an essential component of Korea’s economy, not a workforce performing the so-called “3D” (dirty, dangerous and difficult) jobs that Koreans shun.

“The first step in doing this would be guaranteeing workers the freedom to change workplaces by making changes to the EPS, which hasn’t been properly revised since it was introduced in 2004,” Shekh said.

Migrant workers under the EPS enter Korea with a contract that initially allows them to work for up to three years. The contract can be extended by one year and 10 months with the employer’s consent, and “diligent workers” are also allowed to re-enter the country after they return to their homeland.

However, as re-contracting and reentry permits are very dependent on employers, workers can get tied to them, leaving themselves open to those who exploit the system to their own advantage, according to the union.

“Thousands of workers a year suffer from unfair treatment such as delayed payments and horrendous accommodation. They are also prevented from applying for compensation for industrial accidents or demanding retirement pay out of fear that their contract will not be extended,” Shekh explained.

He hoped that this year, the government will finally respond to their years-long demands and improve the system.

“We are not asking for tons of additional money to fix the problem. What we need are genuine changes that will guarantee safe working environments and fundamental labor rights, which should be provided to everyone in the country.”

Fixing ‘bureaucratic’ approach

Wang Ji-yeon, head of Migrant Women Association in Korea, believes that many of the “bureaucratic policies” that the government comes up with are failing to provide actual help to multicultural families in need.

Wang, a marriage migrant from China who has been working as a migrants’ rights activist for 12 years, said that over the years, support for multicultural families has increased in quantity, but not in quality.

According to government data, there are over 200 support measures provided to marriage migrants and their families.

“The figures create a misperception among native Koreans that the government is spending too much on multiracial families, which is not true,” Wang said. She urged the government to disclose full data to the public on the operation of multicultural policies and regularly receive feedback from beneficiaries to eliminate unnecessary measures.

Moreover, while the current support mainly focuses on the family life of foreign-born wives, it should be expanded to their social and cultural activities as more and more women are seeking career development and preparing for a stable life in their later years.

Education on cultural diversity needed

Students from multicultural backgrounds face challenges due to discrimination and social prejudice. Lee Chan-yeong, a high school student born to a Filipina mother and Korean father, suggests that this can be improved through early education in and outside of schools.

“Many people are not used to cultural diversity, probably because they grew up and were educated in a technically homogeneous country,” said Lee, a second grader at Jeonbuk National University High School in Jeonju, North Jeolla Province.

While schools should ensure that mandatory educational programs on cultural diversity and anti-discrimination are given in the classroom, the government and media should improve their representations of biracial families, he suggested.

“Documentaries, news articles and movies on multicultural children tend to focus only on the dark side such as school bullying, economic hardship, poor fluency in Korean and so on. As the media has a big influence on teens, this negativity may create misperceptions,” he said.

Lee added that more positive content using public advertising and YouTube videos on cultural and ethnic diversity should be developed.

Source: Korea urged to fix immigration policies

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Korea: Migrant women call for ‘Equal pay for equal work’

2020/12/18 Leave a comment

Of note:

Hundreds of female migrant workers employed at government-run facilities are suffering discrimination and unfair treatment, according to a recent survey by Hope Center with Migrant Workers, a civic group based in Seoul.

The survey results were revealed on Wednesday at a discussion session held by the Women Migrants Human Rights Center of Korea ahead of International Migrants Day which falls on Dec. 18.

About 80 percent of the 403 respondents working as interpreters, counselors and bilingual tutors stated that they have experienced discrimination such as unequal payment, limited promotion opportunities and unrecognized work experience.

“I’ve been working as an interpreter at a multicultural family support center for 13 years, during which I have never received holiday bonuses or extra pay for meal costs that are obviously provided to my Korean coworkers,” a marriage migrant was quoted as saying by the civic group. She requested anonymity.

“I don’t understand why I am paid less than my colleagues although we are given similar tasks. It’s hard to imagine that a state-run facility aimed at improving multicultural awareness openly discriminates employees by their nationality,” said another migrant woman with five years of work experience at the support center.

According to the data provided by the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family in October, bilingual tutors at public schools earn around 26.3 million won ($24,100) yearly, and interpreters working at multicultural support centers earn an average of 25.6 million won ― roughly 66 percent of the average annual salary of employees at the centers, which stood at 34.2 million won.

The civic group pointed out that the lack of details on wage guidelines has widened the payment gap.

The wage guidelines set by the ministry only state that interpreters and counselors should be paid “over the minimum wages,” whereas the specific manuals for Korean employees guarantee a yearly pay raise and chances for promotion based on their consecutive years of employment.

The survey also found that 91 percent of the migrant women experienced weak job security as their employment is based on temporary contracts of 10 months or one year. Also, 67 percent of the women have experienced workplace bullying such as verbal abuse and insults towards their home country.

“These issues, which have not been properly addressed for years, have turned into long-term systemic discrimination. Even the latest support measures from the gender ministry failed to reflect the realities in the workplace,” Wang Ji-yeon, head of the Migrant Women Association in Korea, told The Korea Times.

“What we need is improved job quality, not increased quantities of vacancies,” she said, regarding the ministry’s recent announcement to increase the number of interpreters in multicultural family support centers to 312 next year from the current 282.

She demanded an overhaul on the employment system; hiring qualified migrant women to full-time positions through proper recruitment procedures and providing education programs for their career development, as well as standardized wage guidelines.

“The current multicultural policies are mainly centered on family lives of migrant women, lacking support for their social activities. The government should recognize their capabilities and contributions to the country, and come up with better measures for them to be accepted as members of our society,” said Hwang Jeong-mi, a researcher at the Institute for Gender Research at Seoul National University.

Source: Migrant women call for ‘Equal pay for equal work’

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Seoul vows to eradicate discrimination against multicultural families

2020/12/12 Leave a comment

Of note:

The government will establish a legal basis to ban hate speech related to race, country or culture, in a bid to eradicate discrimination against multicultural families, according to the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family, Friday.

“Multicultural families in Korea are experiencing a serious level of discrimination and isolation in daily life,” Vice Minister of Gender Equality and Family Kim Kyung-sun said at a briefing held at the Seoul Government Complex.

“We plan to establish legal grounds to eliminate discrimination and social prejudice formed through hateful expressions related to race, country or culture, by making a revision to the Multicultural Family Support Act.”

The same day, the ministry, in cooperation with related authorities such as the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, announced a set of measures to build an inclusive society for biracial families.

The comprehensive measures are aimed at improving acceptance by guaranteeing people with multicultural background equal access to social activities and welfare services without blind spots.

A monitoring group will soon be launched to watch for discriminative expressions in publications and educational materials issued by central and local governments.

In order to resolve the educational gap and ensure equal education opportunities for multicultural children, consultation sessions and information on career development will be provided through the multicultural information platform Danuri.

The ministry also plans to distribute additional Korean language education programs so that multicultural children do not suffer from communication difficulties during remote classes.

Cha Yoon-gyung, former president of the Korean Association for Multicultural Education, welcomed the expanded supportive measures to multicultural students, while expressing concerns that state policies lack plans on how to educate Koreans on multiculturalism.

“The policies should be more focused on ways to improve Korean citizens’ perspective and understanding on multiculturalism in order to eliminate cultural-based discrimination,” Cha told The Korea Times.

“Providing civil servants and students at school with only several hours of education on cultural diversity will not raise their multicultural awareness. The government should give stronger messages on zero-tolerance towards discrimination by legislating an anti-discrimination law.”

The measures also include prohibiting international marriage ads that violate human rights of marriage migrants, as migrant women’s rights groups have been pointing out that the contents, aimed mostly at Korean men looking for brides from Southeast Asian countries, were found to contain discriminatory and misogynic expressions.

Starting next year, international marriage brokers will be banned from including the face, height and weight of the brides in the ads, and will take mandatory education programs on gender awareness and human rights, following the revision to the Act on Marriage Brokerage Agencies.

The government will increase job opportunities for marriage migrants using their bilingual talents by expanding the number of interpreters at multicultural family support centers, and will constantly provide them with job openings in local companies.

The comprehensive measures come as, despite the increasing number of multicultural families in the country, social acceptance towards them stays relatively low, according to data from the ministry.

As of last year, the number of multicultural household members reached 1.06 million, which accounts for 2.1 percent of the total population, and the number of multicultural births marked 17,939, or 5.9 percent of the total births.

Source: Seoul vows to eradicate discrimination against multicultural families

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Korea: Immigration not the only solution to demographic change

2020/11/24 Leave a comment

Interesting take, reflecting under-employment of women in Korea:

From an agrarian economy in the 1960s to now one of the strongest economic forces in Asia, Korea has evidently achieved tremendous economic growth, which not only comes with fiscal and welfare improvements but also demographic changes. The United Nations predicted that Korea’s population will peak in 2024 and decrease from then on and a 2000 UN Population Division report suggests immigration as a solution to this issue.

Yet, the rate at which Korea’s population is decreasing would require a mass immigration so large that it becomes an ineffective solution. Therefore, it has to be done at a smaller scale and coupled with other solutions that rely on Korea’s existing population.

The demographic change looming over this country ― and others ― is called demographic transition, which is the decrease in fertility and infant death rate due to improved welfare and technological development. It occurs in developed countries and results in a declining and aging population. The latter is the change in age structure to one with a greater proportion of older age groups, whereas the former is the change in the total overall population.

Immigration intended to offset the decline in the population size is called replacement migration, yet it can also address the declining working-age population. Based on the UN report, Korea has to aim for an annual net immigration of 800,000 between 2035 and 2050 to maintain the ratio of a working-age individual to retiree at 3.0. To bring in that number of people annually is close to impossible considering Korea’s past trends: 156,000 in 2018, and 32,000 in 2019.

To actualize our goal of sustainable economic growth, our solution itself should be sustainable. Therefore a more direct immigration policy is suggested. An example is Japan’s 2019 immigration policy that created two new visa status types for foreigners working in sectors experiencing labor shortages. With this solution, the country with the highest proportion of people over 65 years old was able to target specific industries that require manpower.

The proposed solution above greatly reduced the UN’s recommended annual net immigration, which means we have to look within the country and utilize existing human capital ― Korean women.

Despite having the highest tertiary education rates out of 36 OECD countries for women aged 25 to 34, Korea ranked 30th in women’s employment. An Ewha Law School professor suggests in a CNN interview that such contradicting statistics are proof that discriminatory hiring is still prevalent despite anti-discriminatory laws.

The Korean judicial system needs to address this issue with stricter consequences. The initiative to change should also come from organizations, and at all levels of management. Every individual is responsible to correct old prejudices and biases that promote sexism.

Yet, encouraging female employment means more than just hiring more women. It also means hiring them for leadership positions, and jobs that are historically perceived to be more appropriate for men ― referring to labor-intensive work.

Other potential solutions are empowering the elderly and extending the work-life of workers. It’s important to mention that this solution is not simply done by increasing the retirement age. Instead, it’s done by carrying out health-related initiatives and promoting lifelong learning.

Firstly, lifelong learning. Currently, Korea already has the Lifelong Education Act. Under this statute, the Korean government can plan programs purposed for cultivating human capital potential.

One way to do that is by providing opportunities for people to learn emerging skills, similar to what the Singapore University of Social Sciences is already doing. They’re offering credits for courses in emerging skills to their alumni. This is a potential solution because technological innovations also mean a workforce that needs to be trained in utilizing said technology. This resource should also be available to people of all ages and employment status.

Secondly, concerning health, investing in preventive countermeasures is impactful. Educating the public on ways to take care of their health will be cheaper compared to subsidizing healthcare costs due to ailments.

One supporting case is the company Johnson & Johnson (J&J) that strategically planned wellness programs for their employee’s social, mental, and physical health. Their efforts resulted in $250 million in healthcare savings. For every dollar J&J spent on wellness programs, they received a return of $2.71 between 2002 and 2008. Harvard Business Review even suggests that every dollar invested in health-risk prevention saves $6 in healthcare costs.

Korea’s working population has been decreasing due to population aging and decline. Replacement immigration has been suggested as a solution to this issue.

Yet the answer to whether or not Korea should embrace more immigration to ensure sustainable growth is not a simple yes or no. Replacement migration is one solution to this, but it shouldn’t be the only one. An issue as complex as this one needs more than just one big solution. Like a pride of lions hunting their prey, so should we address this issue, with several solutions.

Maria Natasha Lintang is a student at the State University of New York, Korea.

Source: Immigration not the only solution to demographic change

Filed under gender, Immigration Tagged with , ,

What Influences South Korean Perceptions on Immigration?

2020/10/07 Leave a comment

Interesting study:

South Korea has not been a major destination for immigration historically. Even today, most attention is focused on the 30,000+ arrivals from North Korea since 1998. Meanwhile, South Korea’s declining birth rate demonstrates a need for immigration, whether ethnically Korean or otherwise. Ethnic Koreans in the region often were provided visa privileges, yet struggled to integrate, while “mixed-blood”residents faced social and institutional discrimination. As non-Korean immigration slowly increased, tolerance for multiculturalism has lagged behind and has further been under analyzed, with discrimination and hostility toward immigrants still commonplace.

As a historically ethnically homogeneous state with less than 5 percent of the population immigrants, the assumption remained that the public preferred ethnic Korean immigration. Yet few studies directly identified whether there were preferences across ethnic Korean groups. For example in 2016 Shang E. Ha, Soo Jin Cho,  and Jeong-Han Kang found that the South Korean public preferred North Koreans over ethnic Koreans from China (Joseonjok). Ethnic Koreans across the former Soviet Union (Koryo-saram), who were forcibly relocated away from the Korean border area by Stalin and who started arriving back in South Korea in the 1990s, also face discrimination and alienation. Those Joseonjok who maintained their Korean language commonly were treated more fairly by South Koreans than Koryo-saram, mostly from Uzbekistan, who often not did maintain the language.

Likewise, largely disparate and anecdotal evidence suggests South Koreans are concerned about non-Korean immigration both from elsewhere in Asia and from the Middle East, in particular. While North Korean arrivals increased since the famine of the 1990s, with a noticeably sharp decline this year, as many as half of South Korea’s immigrants consist of Chinese citizens, mostly of whom are ethnically Chinese, but also include ethnic Koreans originally living near the North Korean border. South Korea also attracts many others, such as Southeast Asians who come in as both foreign brides to rural workers and economic migrants for what is known as 3-D jobs (dirty, dangerous, and difficult).

Many of the concerns about economic immigration in South Korea parallel public concerns seen in other developed states. However, South Korea has also recently become a destination for asylum seekers as well. Burmese arriving since the 1990s have been caught in shifting categorizations of migrants and refugees. In addition, the arrival of Yemeni asylum seekers appeared to ignite latent Islamophobia and fuel claims that arrivals were just economic migrantsand a threat to the safety of Korean women, with over 700,000 signing an e-petition to President Moon Jae-in opposing granting refugee status. African asylum seekers have found a similar hostility. Limited comparative research finds that majorities of South Koreans do not support accepting non-Korean and especially Muslim refugees, especially compared to accepting North Koreans. Meanwhile, limited evidence suggests that immigration from European and other Western countries does not elicit the same concerns, perhaps due to assumptions that such migration is short-term and often in areas of high demand (e.g. teaching English).

We wanted to directly test the extent to which the South Korean public differentiates among immigrant groups, and specifically to what extent various ethnic Korean immigrant groups in general or specific co-ethnic immigrants are preferred to non-ethnic Korean immigrants. In addition, we wanted to identify whether South Koreans may just be hesitant to support immigration of any kind.

To tackle these issues, we surveyed 1,200 South Koreans during September 9-18, via a web survey conducted by Macromill Embrain, using quota sampling by region and gender. We randomly assigned respondents to one of eight prompts to evaluate on a five-point scale (strongly disagree to strongly agree).

The prompts were:

“The South Korean government should encourage…

Version 1: “… ethnic Koreans abroad to move to South Korea”

Version 2: “…North Koreans to move to South Korea.”

Version 3: “…ethnic Koreans from China to move to South Korea.”

Version 4: “…ethnic Koreans from Central Asia and Russia to move to South Korea.”

Version 5. “…Europeans to move to South Korea.”

Version 6: “…Southeast Asians to move to South Korea.”

Version 7: “…Africans to move to South Korea.”

Version 8: “…Middle Easterners to move to South Korea.”

Starting with ethnic Koreans, we find the undifferentiated prompt (Version 1) elicits more opposition (42.28 percent) than support (19.46 percent). This suggests perhaps an acknowledgement of the limits to what South Korea can absorb, even if ethnic identity remains strong. Among the three differentiated ethnic Korean groups, less than 30 percent agree than South Korean should encourage immigration.

The group South Koreans are least likely to want to encourage to move to South Korea are ethnic Koreans from China (59.59 percent), followed by North Koreans (50.32 percent). One possible explanation for this could be that North Koreans receive government assistance after defecting to South Korea, and therefore are commonly viewed as an economic burden on the country. Ethnic Koreans from China likely are viewed as economic migrants than refugees. Moreover, the disapproval of Korean-Chinese immigration may be caused in part by the outbreak of COVID-19, which has caused a rise in Sinophobia across the globe.

Interestingly, the figure above shows that South Koreans are most likely to agree with encouraging ethnic Koreans from Central Asia or Russia out of all the ethnic Koreans mentioned. This is especially fascinating when considering the wide difference of treatment between Koreans from Central Asia and North Koreans, as the latter are automatically granted citizenship. The data perhaps suggests that South Koreans are more sympathetic to the forced migration of ethnic Koreans under Stalin and the particular hardships they face in establishing citizenship in South Korea. However, even here, only 24.16 percent of respondents agreed that ethnic Koreans from Central Asia and Russia should be encouraged to immigrate.

South Koreans were even less likely to agree with encouraging non-ethnic Koreans to move to South Korea. In particular, 62.92 percent either disagreed or strongly disagreed with encouraging Africans to move to South Korea, with majorities not supportive of encouraging Middle Eastern (54.6 percent) or Southeast Asia migration (56.38 percent) either.

In contrast, Europeans seem to be an outlier for views on non-ethnic Koreans with only 30.46 percent of South Koreans disagreeing with encouraging their immigration. Of all groups, European immigration was the only group in which a majority of respondents (52.98 percent) stated they neither disagreed nor agreed with encouraging immigration. Notably, more people supported encouraging Europeans to immigrate to South Korea than similar encouragement for ethnic Koreans from China or North Koreans. This not only suggests the limits of shared ethnic identity, but suggests perceptions of an economic burden of these co-ethnic groups, compared to immigration from more economically affluent European countries.

Comparing both figures, we can see that South Koreans overall are more welcoming toward ethnic Koreans, but not by wide margins, with most respondents hesitant to encourage immigration of any group. This suggests factors beyond ethnic identity, perhaps economic burden, playing a crucial role.

Previous studies find that perceptions differ across demographic groups, with younger South Koreans more accepting of immigrants regardless of their ethnicity and men being marginally more supportive than women. We ran separate statistical models for support of each immigration version for basic demographic factors (gender, age, education, household income) as well as political ideology and pride in being Korean. We find age positively corresponds with greater support only in Versions 1, 3, and 4, but in none of the non-ethic Korean models. Surprisingly, the ethnic pride variable was only statistically significant in Version 1. In other words, respondents proud to be Korean were more supportive of encouraging ethnic Korean immigration, but this did not translate to greater support for specific ethnic Korean groups.

These results have clear ramifications in the lives of South Koreans and South Korean immigrants. First, despite sharing an ethnicity and often cultural practices, South Koreans are hesitant to accept the notion that co-ethnics should all live in one state. Part of this may be due to the economic burden of ethnic Korean immigration from the region, but may also indirectly suggest that the public’s view of a shared identity is weaker than outside observers may have assumed. Secondly, the findings suggest not only concern about immigration from poorer areas and perhaps the potential for more asylum seekers arriving in South Korea, but immigration as a whole.

Taken as a whole, the public’s hesitancy to support immigration may partially explain the limited attempts by the government to promote less restrictive immigration laws or programs that aid those already in country. That South Koreans rarely interact with immigrant communities likely exacerbate this problem. Without efforts to encourage such contact, South Korea may continue to struggle to encourage the integration of immigrants into society.

Source: What Influences South Korean Perceptions on Immigration?

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism Tagged with

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