Commentary No. 51, November 1, 2000
"The Nobel Peace Prize and Korean Reunification"
President Kim Dae Jung of the Republic of Korea was awarded this year's Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts to reduce tensions on the Korean peninsula. Korea is one of four nations that were structurally divided as a result of the Cold War: China, Germany, Korea, and Vietnam. In all four countries there was, from the outset, a combination of strong emotional desire for reunification and strong ideological conflict between the two political structures. Each situation had its peculiarities.
Two of the partitions have now been resolved: Germany and Vietnam. In the case of Germany, the East German state, the German Democratic Republic, was fatally delegitimated by the wave of transformation that hit eastern Europe's Communist bloc in 1989. When the Berlin wall crumbled, and Chancellor Kohl of the Federal Republic of Germany offered a straightforward incorporation of East Germany into the Federal Republic, the offer was rapidly taken up, and German reunification occurred.
This was reunification of West German terms. The offer seemed irresistible to East Germans not merely because of nationalist sentiment but because West Germany seemed incredibly prosperous and the reunification offer was sweetened by provisions that seemed very economically advantageous to individual East Germans. Since, however, the reunification took place on West German terms, the East Germans were able to protect neither their positions nor their factories. Essentially, all state institutions in East Germany were dismantled and there were purges of the civil service. There were widespread purges also in such para-state institutions as universities, art institutions, and hospitals. In many of these institutions, the purged personnel were replaced by persons coming from West Germany. There is some feeling today that East Germany was "colonized" by West Germany.
As for production structures, they were privatized and in many cases shut down. The replacement structures have not always lived up to expectations, and the east German areas still have high levels of unemployment. There remains an economic gap between the standards of living in western and eastern Germany, even though today the two zones comprise one country. On the other hand, the cost to West Germans of the economic advantages they gave to East Germans has been far higher than they anticipated, and has caused some grumbling, if not regret.
The second reunification, Vietnam, was quite different. Here there was a war, a civil war if you wish, and one in which outside powers were quite involved. In particular, the United States sent large numbers of troops to assist the government of South Vietnam, the Republic of Vietnam. As we all know, in the end, the war was won by the North Vietnamese state, forcing the United States to withdraw, and reunifying Vietnam by force. Here too, as in Germany, there was a purge, but a much more severe one in terms of individual consequences for persons who had been associated with the South Vietnamese state. One consequence, unlike Germany, was that there were many refugees from South Vietnam. The more successful ones resettled in the United States and other Western countries. The less successful ones became the boat people who attempted, usually with minimal success, to resettle elsewhere in eastern Asia.
The division in China has three aspects quite different from the other three cases. As a result of the civil war, which the Chinese Communists won, the Kuomintang state and its officials retreated to Taiwan and continued to claim to be the legitimate government of China. Eventually, they lost all significant diplomatic recognition, even from the United States. However, since Taiwan was an island, it has been difficult to resolve the division by force, especially since the United States has guaranteed the government in Taiwan against military action by the mainland government. This is difference number one, a border that is of water.
The second difference from the other cases of cold war division is that Taiwan has an indigenous population who are not Han Chinese. There has been a strong independence movement on the island, and in the most recent elections, for the first time, a president was elected who had the backing of the Taiwanese movement and did not have the backing of the Kuomintang, whose strength remains among those persons who are Han Chinese ethnically and quite often refugees from the mainland.
The third difference is demographic. All three other cold war divisions created two states of roughly the same area and population. But here we have a population giant, mainland China, facing a smaller albeit sizeable state in Taiwan (but its size pales beside that of mainland China). Taiwan is however today a quite wealthy state, and with this wealth is able to maintain significant armed forces. Mainland China is offering reunification on the same terms it offered Hong Kong - a sort of 50-year guarantee that, if Taiwan were to rejoin mainland China peaceably, its institutions would remain intact for 50 years. Neither the Kuomintang groups nor the Taiwanese nationalists seem anxious to consider these terms seriously. For the moment, there are no active negotiations.
Today, for the first time, there are serious discussions between the governments of South Korea and North Korea. It was because he helped to make this possible that President Kim was given the Nobel Peace Prize. But the situation is not an easy one. The regime in North Korea retains the most traditionally Stalinist mode of organization (politically, economically, and culturally) of all those who have proclaimed themselves Marxist-Leninist since the Second World War. In addition, it seems to be in an extremely difficult economic situation, with widespread hunger and undernourishment. It has few real friends diplomatically. The closest friend is probably the People's Republic of China, and even with China there are some strains.
The one strong card the North Korean state has in their suit is military strength, and in particular the degree to which they have been able to make progress in nuclear weapons. It is this military strength that has led the United States, after decades of unremitting hostility and boycott, to enter into serious diplomatic discussions with North Korea. There is even the prospect that, in the next year or two, the two countries will exchange ambassadors. But whatever happens, North Korea seems determined not to go the way of East Germany.
As for the government of South Korea, they seem to be motivated by a mixture of factors: one, fear that they will be left out in the wake of direct North Korean-United States negotiations; but perhaps even more, the opportunity of moving forward seriously to closer relations that could eventually lead to peaceful reunification. The South Korean government is held back by two factors. Not everyone in South Korea wants to move ahead. And South Korea is not sure that the two previous reunifications have worked all that well. Above all, they do not think they have the money that the West German government had to invest in the project, and therefore are wary of Germany as a model.
So, it will not be easy at all to make significant progress. And undoubtedly, if Korean reunification were to occur, it would not resemble in its form with the German or Vietnamese or putative Chinese versions. What can be said is that Korean reunification would probably have a far greater impact on the geopolitical scene than any of the others. It would transform the relations of China and Japan by intruding a powerful third actor on the regional scene. It might thereby actually assist in the establishment of a strong east Asian bloc on the world scene.
So the Nobel Peace Prize was given in the hope that opportunities will be intelligently seized - a prize of encouragement.
Immanuel Wallerstein
[Copyright by Immanuel Wallerstein. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to download, forward electronically or e-mail to others and to post this text on non-commercial community Internet sites, provided the essay remains intact and the copyright note is displayed. To translate this text, publish it in printed and/or other forms, including commercial Internet sites and excerpts, contact the author at iwaller@binghamton.edu; fax: 1-607-777-4315.
These commentaries, published twice monthly, are intended to be reflections on the contemporary world scene, as seen
from the perspective not of the immediate headlines but of the long term.]
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