Abstract
This chapter examines the development of Korean legal philosophy. Korean legal philosophers did not blindly accept Western theories but utilized them to develop philosophies fitting a Korean legal reality. Korean legal philosophers were suppressed for more than thirty years after the Korean War by authoritarian regimes, which emphasized anti-communism and modernization. However, they pursued critical legal positivism and democratic natural law theory supporting universal human rights, democracy, and the rule of law. Their efforts contributed to abolishing anti-democratic laws and creating a democracy. They also analyzed Korea’s unique traditional legal culture and sought to construct Korean legal theories, such as Pungto Theory and Gikbun Ethics. We divided this process into four periods: (1) liberation from Japanese imperialism and recovery from the Korean War (1945–1950s); (2) authoritarianism and the democratic movement (1960s–1980s); (3) the democratic movement’s success and the transition to democracy (late 1980s–early 1990s); and (4) the expansion of liberalism and value pluralism (late 1990s–present).
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