초록
In the present Chinese-character cultural sphere, the term konghwa has been used as the standard translation of republic. This semantic equation raises a question, how konghwa, which originally refers to the konghwa regency in ancient China and literally means “cooperation and harmony,” came to be associated with this Western concept, which etymologically means “public thing” or “public good.” The answer to this question will also have a profound influence on our understanding of Article 1 of the constitution of South Korea, which stipulates “Taehan min’guk shall be a minju konghwaje,” a seemingly pleonastic expression, as shown in the English translation: “The ‘Republic’ of Korea shall be a democratic ‘republic.’” To address these interrelated questions, this work explores the linguistic and historical contexts of early modern Japan, China, and Korea, where the initial association was made between the words konghwa and republic, and also the period when the official name of South Korea and its constitution were initially created. In conclusion, this article provides answers to these questions by showing the close association between konghwa and the political system of the United States, particularly, the indirect voting system for its presidential election.
키워드
konghwa, republic, Article 1 of the Constitution of South Korea, the United States, indirect presidential election
INTRODUCTION
In the present Chinese-character cultural sphere, no words can more comprehensively encapsulate the shared political identity than the term republic. Excluding Japan, which has retained a constitutional monarchy since the Meiji Restoration, this term has been incorporated into the official English names of all other nations in the sphere (China, Taiwan, South Korea, North Korea, Vietnam, and Singapore), spanning not only the political borders between the nations but also the ideological boundaries between socialism and capitalism. Additionally, most of these nations also incorporate
South Korea adopted its official name, Taehan min’guk 大韓民國, from its former provisional government of the colonial period, together with Article 1 of the Provisional Constitution of the Republic of Korea, promulgated on April 11, 1919. It reads “Taehan min’guk shall be a
The significance of Article 1 has recently attracted the attention of scholars, but an inherent critical problem has yet to be properly illustrated and addressed.
Linguistically, the equating of republic with
1. FROM REGENCY TO THE UNITED STATES
Historically,
The story of the
The provocative nature of this
Moving to the early modern period, there is great historical significance to be found in exploring the process by which the
The first case in which the word
Linguistically, as detailed in Section 3 below, the term
Pic. 1.. Utagawa Yoshikazu,
This
In late nineteenth-century Japan, the political system of the United States strongly appealed to Japanese intellectuals who were seeking an alternative to the imperial system restored by the Meiji Restoration. In 1873, Nakamura Masanao (中村正直: 1832–1891) translated Ransom H. Hooker’s (1800–1876)
The spread of republican ideas provoked strong antagonism in Japan. Yasui Sokken (安井息軒: 1799–1876), who was a leading Confucian scholar during the Edo and Meiji periods, witnessed that a large number of Japanese intellectuals, including some of his own students saw republicanism as the only means to “enrich the country and strengthen the military” (J.
Yasui argued that Western republicanism was firmly based on Christianity (J.
The doctrine established by Christ marks the idea of a ruler as being a figment of the imagination and [promotes the idea that] offering wealth to him is equivalent to accumulating it in heaven. [Therefore, the people] dislike a tax collector [of a government] more than a thief. They disrespect their rulers and admire Christ as being the son of the true ruler. This is the gist of republicanism.
For Yasui, just as East Asian politics was inseparable from Confucianism, republicanism was firmly grounded in Christianity. He asserted that Westerners, who were deluded by Christianity, did not have the capacity to understand the genuine truths of Confucian virtues like loyalty, filial piety, benevolence, and righteousness.
It is not the case, however, that Yasui was completely ignorant of the reality of Western republicanism. Regarding the electoral system for presidential election, he argued that no matter how sincere and unbiased the public tried to be, due to the necessarily limited nature of their understanding and insight, the election was liable to fail in its ambition to elect a truly competent man. He continued his criticism by saying that because of the absence of a hierarchical order between the ruler and ministers, the authority of a president tended to be undermined by other authorities and figures, which would result in weak leadership of the government.
Yasui could not stop the flow of history. Morita Shiken (森田思軒: 1861–1897) derided Yasui, remarking that “citing the
7 In his 1895 French translation of the
8 Sima Qian, “Shi’er zhuhou nianbiao” 十二諸侯年表,
9 For an integrated analysis of the two original accounts and the subsequent reinterpretations through the premodern periods of China, Japan, and Korea, see Yi Chŏng-hwan (Lee Junghwan ), “Wangkwŏn ch’ant’al kwa chŏngt’ongchuŭi kunjuch’e: Chŏn kŭndae Chungguk, Han’guk, Ilbon esŏ ŭi
10 Mitsukuri Shōgo,
11 Ōtsuki Fumihiko,
12 This image is available at
13 Ransom H. Hooker,
14 Koga Katsujirō 古賀勝次郎, “Yasui Sokken to Nakamura Keiu: Yasui Sokken kenkyū josetsu” (安井息軒と中村敬字: 安井息軒研究序説),
15 Yasui Sokken,
16 Yasui, ibid., 2.12a, 2.12b, and 2.14a.
17 Yasui, ibid., 2.11a–12b.
18 Yasui, ibid., 2.12b.
19 Yasui, ibid., 2.12b–13b.
20 Yasui, ibid., 2.13b.
21 Yasui, ibid., 2.13b.
22 Kōzen Hiroshi, “Katō Shūichi shi no hōkoku ni yosete,” 42.
2. KONGHWA AS A REVIVAL OF THE IDEAL CONFUCIAN RULE
The association between the words,
After pacifying the country, [George] Washington decided to decline military authority and return to a rural life. However, the public did not let him go and supported him as the ruler of the country (C.
Xu’s description cited above demonstrates his considerable knowledge, relative to the context of his time, about the political system of the United States. What deserves special attention is that the feudalism of the Zhou influenced Xu’s account of the United States’ political system. The word
Indeed, Xu more overtly revealed that the feudal system of the Zhou underpinned his understanding of the political system of the United States in the following comment:
I think as follows: [George] Washington is an extraordinary man! … Even though he unsheathed a three foot-long sword and subjugated a ten thousand
This creative misunderstanding of the American presidential system is also found in the works of early modern Japanese intellectuals. In his “Three [Underpinnings] of the State” (
Sun Yat-sen, the founding father of the first republican government in East Asia, went further in claiming that republicanism was highly compatible with the Chinese political tradition. In 1885, in response to the uprising that occurred in Guangzhou Province, he planned to make the provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi into an independent republican state. In 1897, he expressed his revolutionary sentiments openly saying, “I believe the autonomy of the people is the acme of a political state. Therefore, my political vision is republicanism.”
One may say that republicanism is not suitable for a barbarian state like China. Yet, this comes from a misunderstanding. The
In this statement, Sun did not merely assert a potential compatibility between republicanism and the Chinese political tradition but proposed the feasibility of constructing a republican government in China by thoroughly eliminating the discrepancy between them.
The kind of Chinese republican government envisaged by Sun seems to have been modeled after the federalism of the United States to a large extent. He stated that if the Guangzhou revolution turned out to be successful, it would be “the pivotal point to firstly, under the name of a federal republic (C.
The
There are two forms of polity. One is despotic government, and the other is constitutional government. The polity, in which one person holds sovereignty at the top and deals with all crucial matters [of state] on his own authority, is called a despotic government. [In contrast,] the polity, in which both a constitution and a congress are established, the government organs are built on this basis, and the cooperation and participation of the people are allowed, is called a constitutional government.
Constitutional government is also classified into democratic constitutionalism and monarchical constitutionalism. The polity, in which a republican government
In providing examples of constitutional government, the authors of the
Turning to Korea, a strong resistance to Western colonialism is a characteristic of that country’s early modern history. However, the bicameral system in England and the presidential system of the United States were introduced to Chosŏn intellectuals as early as 1857 by Ch’oe Han-gi (崔漢綺: 1803–1877) in his work,
Yi Ki (李沂: 1848–1909), an advocate of land reform at the end of the Chosŏn period and an anti-Japanese colonialism activist in the early twentieth century, presented a novel conception of “governmental systems” (K.
Yi Ki’s argument is reminiscent of the views proposed by Sun Yat-sen and Yokoi Shōnan in that he drew parallels between the principles underlying Western republicanism and the Confucian political ideal of high antiquity, particularly in relation to the transmission of sovereign authority. Along this line of reasoning, they commonly reflected on the possibility of reviving an ideal Confucian government through implementing the presidential system of Western republicanism. In reaction to this apparently far-fetched idea, some Korean modernists identified the Confucian way of governance instead with despotism, thus asserting an incompatibility between the East Asian political tradition and the genuine ideals of republicanism.
Nevertheless, the historical significance of the association between Confucianism and republicanism in early modern East Asia cannot be underestimated. This association greatly influenced Rhee Syngman in the early stage of his political career. He reiterated Yi Ki’s argument almost verbatim in his
23 Xu Jiyu,
24 Xu Jiyu, Ibid, 277.
25 See Xiajian Zhishu (Hazama Naoki), “Dui Zhongguo jindai minzhu yu
26 Fukuzawa Yukichi,
27 Xiajian Zhishu (Hazama Naoki), “Dui Zhongguo jindai minzhu yu
28 Sun Yat-sen, “Yu Miyazaki Toraz Hirayama Shu de tanhua,”
29 Sun Yat-sen, ibid., 173.
30 For this, see Zou Rong,
31 Here, instead of
32 Wang, ibid., 9.
33 Wang, ibid., 11.
34
35 Yi Ki,
36 For this, see Kim Taek-yŏng (金澤榮: 1850–1927),
37 Rhee Syngman,
3. KONGHWA IN EARLY MODERN BILINGUAL DICTIONARIES
The linguistic association between
Thus far, I have translated
In early modern Japanese, the term
This inclusive, inconsistent translation did not stem directly from a misunderstanding of the English words. Shimada Yutaka 島田豊 published two versions of English-Japanese dictionaries, one in 1888 and the other in 1892, primarily by translating an unabridged version of Webster’s
In short, these findings lead to a tentative conclusion that through the end of the nineteenth century, linguistic equivalence was hardly “invented,” per Lydia Liu’s terminology, between these Western political terms and the Japanese language. Rather, many mutually distinctive Japanese words were adopted from classical literature or were newly coined so as to broadly encapsulate the meaning of the targeted English words. These quasi-neologisms, however, remained mutually interchangeable to a large degree in nineteenth century Japan without forming a one-to-one equivalence.
A greater degree of divergence is detected in early modern Chinese bilingual dictionaries. The most striking example of differences from the Japanese translations concerns the word democracy. The first English-Chinese dictionary was likely the appendix produced by Robert Morrison (1782–1834) in his
It is unknown why these European missionaries (Morrison and Medhurst from the United Kingdom and Lobscheid from Germany) deliberately attributed such pejorative meanings to democracy, but it is highly probable that this attitude had something to do with the political backgrounds of their home countries, which were in tension with the republican governments of France and the United States. Justus Doolittle and Ira M. Condit, both of whom were American Board missionaries, reflected on the word’s etymological sense—
The Chinese compound word most commonly used by these missionaries to translate republic was
Even in this post-revolution dictionary, however, a linguistic equivalence had yet to be established between the targeted English words and the translated Chinese words. The term
In comparison to Japan and China, far fewer bilingual dictionaries were produced in early modern Korea. One can clearly detect, however, that a similar linguistic phenomenon took place in translating Western languages into Korean. As seen in
It is necessary to point out that this universal linguistic confusion in early modern East Asia originally arose from one found in English dictionaries. The 1828 edition of Noah Webster’s
In short, even though an extensive and in-depth research is required to reach a more reliable conclusion, this preliminary examination brings to light an important fact about the “translingual practice” in early modern Each Asia, a fact that makes a striking contrast with Lydia Liu’s approach. As is discussed in the introductory part of the present article, Liu applied a Marxist view of the exchange of unequal values in a capitalist economy to her study of translinguistic phenomena in modern China. Her approach was predicated on an assumption of one-to-one correspondence between targeted European words and translated Chinese words.
38 Chiba Kengo 千葉謙悟, “Yakugo no imi hendō: Nit-Chū-Kan no okeru gasshū” (paper presented at the 4th Kanji bunkaken kindaigo kenkyūkai, Kansai University, March 13–14, 2004), 201–216.
39 Hori Tatsnoskay (Hori Tatsunosuke),
40 Noah Webster, An
41 Webster, An
42 Webster, An
43 Webster,
44 James A. H. Murray,
45 Liu,
4. KONGHWA IN ARTICLE 1 OF THE PROVISIONAL CONSTITUTION
Moving to early twentieth century Korea, when Chosŏn was annexed by Japan in 1910 and once the 1911 republican revolution broke out in China, some Korean intellectuals sought a way to reverse this tide. Yu In-sŏk, (柳麟錫: 1842–1915), for example, was one of the active Korean traditionalists who advocated “revering Chinese civilization and expelling barbarians” (K.
The first collective action to establish a republican government in Korea was organized by Taehan Sinminhoe (大韓新民會: New People’s Association). Some scholars have emphasised the gradual domestic process from the late nineteenth century in establishing republicanism on Korean soil.
With the establishment of a provisional government in 1919, Korea embarked on a full-scale movement toward republicanism. On April 11, 1919, the provisional government promulgated a provisional constitution and formally declared the establishment of a republican government. Article 1 of this provisional constitution stipulates that “Taehan min’guk shall be a
The official name of South Korea, Taehan min’guk, was also first established with the promulgation of this provisional constitution. This name was created mainly by replacing the “
As seen in the tables in the Appendices,
For the sake of comparison, the Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China (Zhonghua
One focal point that makes further clarification possible, concerning the semantic distinction between
As Article 19 cited above indicates, the Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China stipulates an indirect voting system for the election of president and vice-president, which shall be exercised by the members of the Advisory Council that represents the people of the respective districts. This indirect electoral system resembles the Electoral College system of the United States to a large extent.
The Provisional Constitution of the Republic of Korea of April 11, 1919, does not include articles about the presidential system and its electoral process at all. In contrast, a presidential system analogous to those of the Republic of China and the United States took shape in the mind of Rhee Syngman. On June 10, 1919, he sent a letter to Robert Lancing, then the United States Secretary of State. It reads:
It may be that you are sufficiently advised of the fact that the Korean National Council at Convention, in Seoul, Korea, on March 1st., 1919 selected me to act as Premier for the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea. The Korean National Council is composed of properly selected delegates from each of the 13 Provinces of Korea and represents all of the people of that country. This Convention acting “in accordance with the will of the People” declared that the Korea State “Shall be a Republic” and that “The representative system of Government shall be adopted.” We have declared ourselves to the World as a democratic, self governed Nation and come to you—a sister Republic from the Far East.
In this letter, Rhee used the two terms republic and democratic separately in different contexts. Specifically, he associated the term “republic” with an indirect voting system. The statement about “the representative system” and its electoral system exercised by the representatives of every province of Korea is indisputably reminiscent of the indirect electoral system both of the United States and the Republic of China. In the letter cited above, Rhee did not allude to a presidential system, but only four days later, Rhee declared internationally that he had been elected president through a due electoral process. In a June 14th letter addressed to Woodrow Wilson, then President of the United States, Rhee informed Wilson, “on April 23rd, 1919, Korea took her place, with other republics of the world, and become a completely organized, self-governed, democratic state,” and that he had been elected “President of the Republic of Korea” by the delegates of the Korean National Council, who in turn were “duly elected from each of the thirteen provinces.”
Rhee was directly involved in the enactment of the provisional constitution promulgated on April 11, 1919. Recently, it has become widely accepted among scholars that this first Korean constitution was written by Cho So-ang 趙素昻, reflecting his “Principle of Three Equalities” (equalities in politics, economy, and education).
The Provisional Constitution of the Republic of Korea, on September 11, 1919, amended Article 1 to state, “Taehan min’guk is composed of the Great Han people” and stipulated that the provisional president shall be elected by the provisional National Council (Article 12).
46 Yu In-sŏk,
47 Yu In-sŏk, ibid.,12.24b–27b, 25.44b–48a, and 25.48b–51a.
48 For this approach, see Sŏ Hŭi-gyŏng,
49 “Chaemi Taehan Sinminhoe chi kōn (March 12, 1909),”
50 For the interrogation reports of the 105-Man Incidents, See “105-in Sakŏn sinmun chosŏ,”
51 This translation is available at
52 For the controversies surrounding the official name, see Han In-sŏp (Han In Sup), “Taehan min’guk ŭn
53 “Imsi Chŏngbu ŭi Hŏnpŏp choan e kwanhan kŏn (April 12, 1919),”
54 “Chosŏn Konghwaguk Hŏnpŏp (May 18, 1919),”
55 “The Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China,” in the
56 “Chosŏn konghwaguk ŭi Kahŏnpŏp ŭro chinghanŭn choan songpu ŭi kŏn,”
57 “Yi Sŭngman yi Miguk Lancing kungmu changkwan ege ponaen sŏhan,”
58 “Yi Sŭngman yi Miguk taet’ongnyŏng ege Taehan konghwaguk ŭi sŏngnip ŭl sogaehanŭn munkŏn,”
59 For this, see “Sŏ Chae-p’il yi Imsi chŏngbu kangnyo ege pŏnaen sŏhan,”
60 For example, Han In-sŏp, “Taehan min’guk ŭn
61
62 “1 Taehan min’guk Imsi Hŏnpŏp (Sep. 11, 1919),”
63 The Provisional Constitution of the Republic of Korea amended by Sep. 11, 1919, shows a great resemblance to the provisional constitution of the Republic of China, especially the first three articles in the General Provisions in terms of contents, vocabulary, and order. The Provisional Constitution of the Republic of China enacted in March 19, 1912 is available at
64 For the decisive role played by Rhee Syngman in the process of the enactment and amendments of the provisional and the first constitutions, see Yu Yŏng-ik, “Yi Sŭngman kukhoe ŭijang kwa Taehan min’guk Hŏnpŏp chejung,” 101–137. The first Constitution of the Republic of Korea (July 17, 1948) is available at
CONCLUSION
At present, the term
My investigation has cast a critical light on the semantic problem inherent in the [Provisional] Constitution of the Republic of Korea through a historical and linguistic investigation. Because both
This article suggests a possible answer to this problem by illuminating the association between the word
Specifically, the analogy between the electoral system of the United States and that prescribed by Rhee Syngman sheds fresh light on the linguistic problem involved in Article 1. It is likely that whereas
65 For the conceptual history of this predicate, see Yi Yŏng-nok, “Han’guk esŏ ŭi ‘Minju konghwaguk ŭi kaenyŏmsa,” 49–83.
66 For example, see An Myŏng-sŏn’s article in
2 This translation is available athttp://english.ccourt.go.kr/home/att_file/download/Constitution_of_the_Republic_of_Korea.pdf (last visited Jan. 25, 2013).
3 For the historical process of the formation of Article 1, see Han In Sup (Han In-sŏp), “Taehan min’guk ŭn minju konghwaje ro ham,”Sŏul Taehakkyo pŏphak 50.3 (Sep. 2009), 167–201. For the significance of its continuity and its modern implications, see Sŏ Hŭi-gyŏng (Suh Hee-kyung) and Pak Myŏng-nim (Park Myung-lim), “Minju konghwa chuŭi wa Taehan min’guk Hŏnpŏp inyŏm ŭi hyŏngsŏng,” Chŏngsin munhwa yŏn’gu 30.1 (2007), 77–111. For its practical implications in present day Korean politics, see Han Sang-hŭi (Han Sang-hie), “’Minju konghwaguk ŭi Hŏnpŏp chŏk hamŭi,” Illam pŏphak 3 (1998), 115–141. For the role of Rhee Syngman, see Yu Yŏng-ik (Lew Young-Ick), “Yi Sŭngman kukhoe ŭijang kwa Taehan min’guk Hŏnpŏp chejung,” Yŏksa hakpo 189 (2006), 101–137.
4 Yi Yŏng-nok, “Han’guk esŏ ŭi ‘Minju konghwaguk ŭi kaenyŏmsa,”Pŏpsahak yŏn’gu 42 (2010), 49– 83.
5 Lydia He Liu,Tokens of Exchange : The Problem of Translation in Global Circulations (Durham, NC:Duke University Press, 1999), 1–29.
6 Lydia He Liu, “Introduction: The Problem of Language in Cross-Cultural Studies,” inTranslingual Practice: Literature, National Culture, and Translated Modernity—China, 1900–1937 (Stanford, CA.: Stanford University Press, 1995), 27.