Peace Education in Korea : The Need for a Paradigm Shift from Unification to Peace on the Korean Peninsula

Abstract

Peace on the Korean peninsula has been fragile over nearly seven decades, since Korea was divided by the Communist North and Capitalist South in 1948. With North Korea armed with nuclear weapons, andtensions building between China and the United States showing no signs of abating, maintaining peace and building up a comprehensive peace system is all the more crucial for the Korean government. In the midst of the ever-changing internal and external environment surrounding the Korean peninsula, unification seems to be an elusive phenomenon. In addition to this, Korea found itself to be a multicultural society, seemingly against its will. The number of foreigners living and working in Korea has exceeded the 1 million mark in 2007 and continues to rise. With birth rates rapidly falling, more foreigners are likely to come to Korea and work. These two phenomena – unification and integration – seem to contradict each other prima facie, and there have been scant efforts in linking these two apparently contradictory trends. This paper aims to link the two and argues that there is a need for a paradigm shift from unification to peace education; it will first examine the present status of unification and multicultural educations and contextualize why there is a need for replacing governmentcentered unification and multiculturaleducations to peace education in which multiple societal actors can participate. This is especially important in view of the evolving and everpresent multicultural society.