This line of interpretation, however, has also been criticized for the fallacy of post hoc ergo propter hoc. Arguments about the influence that March First had on contemporary national movements, including China’s May Fourth, have in fact existed for decades. There have, of course, been discussions in the Korean academia about the significance of the March First in world history. For that to be achievable, it is imperative that we examine the significance of the March First in the context of the world history as well as its meaning in the context of civilizational shifts.īeijing students protest the Treaty of Versailles during the May Fourth Movement of 1919 The question is thus how well this new remembering can function as a common intellectual foundation for the future. It is beyond a doubt that the recent advent of new ways to characterize the March First-we are even seeing proposals to replace the term (March First) “movement” with “revolution”-is a response to the latest sociopolitical changes. How we should remember the May Fourth is not just a question of the past, but also of the present.
How one should remember China’s May Fourth Movement (hereafter the May Fourth), which celebrated its 100 th anniversary in 2019, has similarly been a subject of debate. A disagreement on the “National Foundation Day”, for example, triggered a heated debate on the historical meaning of the March First and the Provisional Government of Korea during the Park Geun-hye administration. Moreover, there have been battles over how the March First should be remembered and defined even within the South itself. The Movement has been remembered differently by the South and the North, especially as Korea’s division became more entrenched after Korea’s liberation.
The March First has been constantly redefined in the context of sociopolitical changes since the 1920s. As the emergence of the phrase the “March First Revolution” evinces, the conventional historical framework of the March First Movement (hereafter, March First) must be reexamined. Having experienced another historical shift through the Candlelight Revolution, we have come to reassess the past hundred years on a fundamental level. At the same time, the Movement’s 100 th anniversary in 2019, just a couple of years after the Candlelight Revolution, prompts critical explorations of more fundamental issues. The new political space created by the “Candlelight Revolution” (2016-2017) and the reconciliatory initiatives between North and South Korea that immediately followed encourage intellectual re-engagement with the March First Movement to see it anew. What new light does the zeitgeist of the “Candlelight Revolution” shed on the March First Movement of 1919? Revisiting the Significance of the March First Movement in World Hi s tory Keywords: March First Movement, May Fourth Movement, Candlelight revolution, East Asiaġ. Their longing for a kaebyŏk that involves more than a mere reform of political institutions/systems connects the years of 19. These revolutionary transformations have been forwarded by the Korean people who remain inspired by the light of the March First. The March First can be regarded as a beginning of a national revolution that sought a kaebyŏk (開闢, a great opening of a new heaven and earth), not only to adapt to modernity but also to overcome it, and the subsequent history is characterized by “incremental unfolding” of the revolution – through April Nineteenth (1960), May Eighteenth (1980), and lately, the Candlelight revolution (2016). To do so, it turns attention to the East Asian configuration in which three nations-Imperial Japan, semi-colonial China, and colonized Korea-were all connected to the world order and interacted with one another while occupying their respective positions in the world hierarchy. Abstract: The articles re-examines the March First Movement of 1919 in light of the “Candlelight Revolution” of 2016-2017 and situates the latter as part of the incremental unfolding of a long revolution that started with the former.