Between the developmental state and popular nationalism: the pure Hangul movement in the early history of the Korean internet

Abstract

Many Western social scientists have believed that South Korea, as one of the typical East Asian developmental states, was greatly influenced by state-led IT development, at least in its early technological development. However, both the 80s and the 90s were autonomous and exceptional periods for computer geek communities and start-ups, which were relatively free from developmental state initiatives. The present study calls attention to the little-known and undervalued historical phase of grassroots computing culture in the early history of the Korean Internet, which can be characterized as a pure Hangul (Korean) movement, even under the dominant paradigm of the developmental state. By investigating the socio-cultural history of that period, the present study aims to articulate the double-sided national motive of compromising the developmental desires of the state and the grassroots practices of the early computing culture in the midst of IT development in Korea. In doing so, the present study delineates how the early computer amateurs and tech-savvies were highly distinctive in localising non-commercial and reciprocal IT drives, and how their PC culture became a historical prelude to the civic hacking culture.