Victimization as a source of political contestation: Evidence from state violence in South Korea
Political violence under authoritarian regimes leaves lingering impacts on the population even after the fall of dictatorship. The experience of violence can shape how much citizens trust the government, show negative sentiment towards former perpetrators, and support politicians related to the past (Chiou and Hong 2021; Lupu and Peisakhin 2017; Rozenas et al. 2017; Rozenas and Zhukov 2019; Wang 2021). The scholarship has focused on political attitudes towards former perpetrators and their victims surrounding past violence, but it has left out the core constituent of transitional justice (TJ) and general public opinion: the non-victimized ordinary citizens. Although TJ has received popular support in many countries, it has also invited politicized responses with some defying the victims’ narratives and justifying autocratic use of violence. The contestation over how to remember the past has become a source of social and political confrontation in many countries between former perpetrators and victims as well as between former victims and ordinary citizens. This project investigates the politics of authoritarian violence and how it shapes public opinion among citizens in post-authoritarian societies.
We identify two key mechanisms that can mediate the relationship between violence exposure and public opinion: official redress for violence and social identity. First, histories of state violence leaves permanent scars on victims, but post-violence official narratives can shape how non-victims understand the event and victims. If a case of violence is recognized by the state and investigated over a long period, information about the violence becomes more widely accepted by the public outside the region (Nalepa 2010; Ang and Nalepa 2019). On the contrary, if it is not recognized, or is recognized only partially, people may not fully acknowledge former victims or continue to believe the justification provided by the old regime. Second, although individuals are exposed to the same information about former violence and transitional justice, they still may not approve of it because they retain a strong sense of group sentiment. If they believe the victims are from their outgroup, they are more likely to agree with the authoritarian justification and oppose official redress or compensation for former victims. Thus, we provide a theoretical framework that examines the variation in official narratives and in individual psychological orientations.
This project tests the two mechanisms with four prominent state violence cases in South Korea: Jeju 4.3 Incident (1947-54), Yeosu-Suncheon Incident (1948), Busan-Masan Uprising (1979), and Gwangju 5.18 Democratic Movement (1980). The violence executed by former dictatorships incurred high casualties, but they differ in terms of official recognition and investigation by the government. Although Gwangju’s truth commission started right after democratization in 1987, other cases received delayed attention, with Jeju’s official investigation starting in 2000, Bu-Ma’s investigation in 2009, and Yeo-Sun’s truth commission starting only recently in 2022, 74 years after the incident. With individual-level surveys, we examine the relationship between exposure to violence and various political attitudes and related voter behavior.