On Tuesday, February 27, author and Director of Foreign Policy In Focus at the Institute for Policy Studies John Feffer led a discussion on the effects of the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea.
He discussed how when North and South Korea marched under one flag and fielded a joint women’s hockey team, the world did not know if this cooperative agenda was temporary. With the U.S. agreeing to an informal temporary truce, the public is unsure of the future of these two very different countries.
Throughout the hour-long discussion, Feffer emphasized that events like these are “reminders
that the divisions are brief,” stressing that the divide can diminish and reappear at any given moment.
Many South Koreans found themselves upset about the unified flag, with a minority view in favor. Feffer elaborated on how he felt it was interesting that Korea was a unified peninsula for hundreds of years before dividing.
With South Korea overcome by a sense of nationalism, Feffer believes that the two Koreas are not close to reunification at all.
He explained that the Koreas are separated in four ways: economically, politically, socially and militaristically. As the self-reliant North Korea turns their back on the global scale, South Korea participates in the global market as one of the top 25 economies of the world.
In the 1970s, however, Feffer explained how South Korea had a GDP comparable to Ghana, with wigs as their primary export. North Korea was backed by the Soviets, so their economy prospered; however, their reliance on cheap oil for their agricultural lifestyle, Feffer elaborated, led to their downfall.
South Korea rose as a major steel producer and China’s decision to raise oil prices in the 1980s put North Korea into a difficult state. In 1995, North Korea entered austerity with 10 percent of its population dying. Today, South Korea is a technological capital, serving as a major trade hub. On the contrary, North Korea is in a period of longterm economic crisis.
Feffer explained that, politically, the two countries could not be more different. North Korea participates in a hereditary dictatorship with a major lack of a civil society. South Korea participates in a democratic government with a diverse political society.
Culturally, South Korea is integrated with the world while North Korea is not.
On the topic of military North Korea’s lack of funding for the military in the past pressured them to endorse in nuclear weapons and sparked the tension that we see today.
With Feffer providing the necessary information to judge the Olympic situation, he brought up some surprising points.
He elaborated that President Trump’s rhetoric challenges North Korea’s overexaggerated rhetoric.
Feffer claimed that the prospect of a strike is more realistic because Trump, from the eyes of North Korea, seems more likely to do it. This fact ultimately tightens sanctions between the U.S. and Korea, pressuring them to a peace agreement.
Feffer elaborated on how there is major hope on the Korean Peninsula for peace, with the flags serving as a sign of hope. However, he explained that many Americans viewed the act as offensive on the side of North Korea, who they see as trying to drive a wedge between South Korea and its major ally, America.
At the end of the discussion,Feffer left his audience with three possible outcomes from the tension in Korea: one being the unlikely use of strategic patience, another being a series of negotiations and the last being war between the U.S. and Korea.
With the third seeming extreme, many officials in the Trump administration support it. Feffer ended the talk with a sense of hope for peace, however stressing that it is a distant possibility.
