文在寅政権による「正統性」の追求と日韓関係

<p>How should today’s Japan-ROK relations be interpreted which is said the worst in their history? This paper discusses the logic of Moon Jae-in administration from the perspectives of its “justification” and “orthodoxy/legitimacy.”</p><p>Under the constraints of the nation’s division and the Cold War, ROK successfully maintained the “justification” of politics as a result of its democratization that took place immediately after the economic development. However, this “justification” was maintained with the lack of political “orthodoxy/legitimacy,” the dilemma of which was inevitably brought to the surface after the end of the Cold War and the democratization.</p><p>It was brought to the surface with the movement of going back their history in a way of trying to secure the “orthodoxy/legitimacy” of their politics by liquidating remnants of “pro-Japanese,” the collaborators with the Japanese colonial government. It was Moon Jae-in administration that played the central role of such movement, the administration that was born as a result of the “Candle Revolution,” which led president Park Geun-hye to her impeachment and dismiss.</p><p>President Moon Jae-in took it as his mission to establish the “orthodoxy/legitimacy” and to bring ROK back to the state of what the nation needs to be like, by eradicating deeply-rooted evils and wiping out “the pro-Japanese conservatives with vested interests.”</p><p>After the liberation, those “pro-Japanese” collaborators were supposed to be condemned, but they were instead protected under the Cold War and turned into a power of pro-Japanese conservatives with vested interests, as the mainstream of the politics and society, by colluding with the authoritarian governments for the sake of anti-communism and economic development. The true liberation and decolonization process, according to the logic, become complete only when successfully having eradicated those pro-Japanese and replaced the mainstream in order to secure the “orthodoxy/legitimacy,” which has been long absent and undiscussed.</p><p>Such movement grew into the denial of “ROK lead by conservatives,” taking place with the eradication of the deeply-rooted evils. It was not necessarily targeted at Japan but inevitably involved the issues of comfort women and forced labor as diplomatic problems, which was crucial for Moon Jae-in administration because it stands on the denial of Park Geun-hye. For Moon Jae-in, Japan-ROK normalization of diplomatic relations in 1965 lacked both “justification” and “orthodoxy/legitimacy,” which was nothing but the deeply-rooted evil.</p><p>If the eradication of pro-Japanese conservatives is expanded to the denial of ROK by conservatives, and furthermore, if Japan-ROK normalization of diplomatic relations is treated as deeply-rooted evils, it could lead to a political situation that will deny the Japan-ROK relations over the past half century and will call for a drastic reconstruction of the relations from the very beginning.</p>