UNESCO's reason for pushing this agreement is clear. Culture directly relates a social group's identity and, unlike products, need to be protected by a country's policies. Countries like the United States seeks to claim profit by selling cultural products like Hollywood movies, and, naturally, wants to see the agreement to have less effect. The European Union, China, India, South Africa, and other nations seek to have the legal protections of their cultural territories be legally binding.
The problem is that the global culture wars are just around the corner and yet the Korean government does not have any strategies in place. One understands that the government has a dilemma on its hands because it has to watch for what the US thinks about "screen quotas," which the US demands Korea do away with, and it also has to find ways for the Hallyu ("Korea fever") and Korean film to make way on the international market. But if Korea is going to increase the competitiveness of its cultural products on the international market it is going to need to strengthen the its cultural characteristics. That is why the government needs to forget the short-term interests and become more actively involved in preparing for this agreement.
If the authorities are having a hard time deciding on what approach to take because of pressure from powerful trading nations, then civic groups working in the area of culture need to step up to the task. Important issues relating to the sustainability of the whole of humanity cannot be entrusted to bureaucrats who measure things only by the economics.
The Hankyoreh, 18 April 2005.
[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]
