Korea

Law and society scholarship in Korea has developed in tandem with and responded to changes in Korean society. This discipline initially made its appearance in the 1960s and 1970s amid the modernization of Korean society and is sometimes seen as a part of the discussion on “law and development.” Scholars argued that the country's history of Confucian tradition and colonial heritage was responsible for the failure or malfunction of newly adopted modern legal systems. Thus, Korean sociolegal scholarship paid attention to legal history, legal culture, and legal attitudes. Here, the primary concern was how to explain malfunctioning from a cultural perspective and overcome or disconnect traditions that people regarded as obstacles to modernization.

Since the 1980s, significant development has occurred in Korea, due in large part to the dramatic political move toward democratization. Under authoritarian rule, the dominant method of legal study had wallowed in speculative dogmatism. To avoid conflict with political authority, scholars did not employ sociolegal approaches based on social reality to redress social problems. Ideological rigidity during the Cold War, derived from the division of the Korean peninsula, suffocated Korean academia and thus did not allow critical analysis of important legal issues.

However, political democratization provided a fertile milieu for sociolegal-minded progressive scholars and practitioners to investigate a variety of issues for across-the-board reform. One of the keenest interests of these scholars was to rid the country of the authoritarian legacies that permeated Korean society and to make improvements for the sake of its citizens. As the number of scholars who employed sociolegal approaches increased, their critical analysis of existing laws and the legal system helped to close the gap between theory and practice. This permitted institutions to achieve the spirit of the law. One problem that the Korean law and society discipline faces is the lack of interchange between legal academics and practitioners of law, and the lack of interdisciplinary collaboration in the field of law.

However, one highly promising development that may facilitate law and society study is the significant role that the new Korean Constitutional Court has played since its inauguration by way of the 1987 Constitution. This court has not bound itself to dogmatic exegesis but confronted cases and displayed judicial activism that previously had been lacking in the Korean judiciary. It has significantly contributed to lessening the gap between law in the book and law in action and has enhanced the authority of the Constitution, which was once regarded as a political manifesto instead of living law. Overall, the improved political environment has vitalized the discipline of law and society scholarship.