The Marmot’s Hole

UPDATE: In an accompanying article, the Dong-A further discusses Korea’s rising xenophobia.

“There aren’t yet any groups like skinheads who kill or severely assault foreigners. But Korea, too, is not a safe zone from xenophobia.” Or so said a 30-year-old Chinese who has lived in Korea for four years. He said Koreans, regardless of education, age or sex, use ethnic slurs for Chinese like jjanggae, jjanggolla and junggungnom too freely. He said Koreans don’t consider at all how uncomfortable these words make Chinese feel.

With 1 million foreigners now residing in Korea, there are increasing calls to block xenophobia and create a healthy multicultural society.

Many experts count the rising number of crimes committed by foreigners as one of the major reasons for the spread of xenophobia. This is because it causes the mistaken understanding that it’s OK to discriminate against foreigners because they are the principle offenders causing social problems.

In recent years, the number intellectual crimes like voice fishing and financial fraud committed by foreigners has skyrocketed. In 2004, foreigners committed 1,660 such crimes. Last year, it had reached 4,536.

A professor at a research institute attached to the police academy said intellectual crimes like voice phishing and financial scams are directed not at just a few, but a wide number of Koreans, and these crimes can, in the short term, lead to increased hostility towards foreigners.

Another issue that needs to be quickly rectified is that unlike the case with Koreans, authorities are unable to take even basic measures needed to prevent and solve foreigner crime (something the Dong-A has complained about before). An official with the foreign affairs division of Seoul Metropolitan Police said prior to long-term resident foreigners naturalized Korean citizens, police cannot collect basic data to help prevent or solve crimes like fingerprints. That’s how difficult it is to solve crimes committed by foreigners, he said.

Then there’s the economic crisis.

Mr. Hwang, an ethnic Korean from China, was recently beaten by his Korean coworker at a construction site on the Seoul subway, being told to “go back to China.” He said many of his compatriots have recently been beaten by Koreans at the workplace.

With jobs growing fewer due to the economic downturn, hostility towards foreign workers is on the rise. With the daily wage for Chinese workers in the Sallim-dong area holding at 50,000 won for the last decade, foreign laborers are often made the target of complaints.

The head of the Migrant Workers Center, however, said in a survey of business owners, 70% said they hire foreigners because they cannot hire Koreans. He said foreign laborers do the “3D” jobs avoided by Koreans and are contributing to Korean economic development by supplementing Korea’s labor force.

To stop xenophobia, the most important things are education about multiculturalism and preparing a system to protect the human rights of foreigners. A researcher at the Korea Labor Institute said the considering Korea’s place in the world, the number of foreigners residing in Korea would necessarily increase, and that one needed to actively come up with measures at the early stage when tensions and problems appear.

A typical model is the “foreigner human rights ordinance” to be put on the floor of the city council of Ansan, Gyeonggi-do. This ordinance seeks to make sure that individuals are not discriminated against or disadvantaged in their daily lives or public facilities due to skin color, race, ethnicity or language. It also calls on companies employing foreigners to work to protect the human rights of foreigners and respect their cultures, including religious activity.

ORIGINAL POST: The Dong-A Ilbo reports that xenophobia is on the rise as Korea’s economic difficulties continue.

On Sunday, news of a mass arrest of illegal migrants was greeted with celebration at an online cafe calling for the expulsion of illegal immigrants.

Other websites, like one opposing Korea’s “multicultural policy” and another calling for measures to deal with foreign laborers, are full of material openly hostile to foreigners, including stuff like, “We must show them how scary a country Korea is.”

These groups even plan to hold a rally and march in Daehangno on Nov 30 calling for a strong crackdown on illegal migrants and an exposing of crimes committed by foreigners.

This growing hostility towards foreigners, reports the Dong-A Ilbo, is due to the increasing number of foreigners living in Korea and the belief that foreign laborers are stealing jobs from low-income earning Koreans at a time economic crisis.

In an online survey conducted by the Justice Ministry, 91.8% of 1,990 respondents said authorities should strengthen their crackdown against illegal migrants. The Labor Ministry’s Migrant Workers Center said it has recently gotten a sudden spike in foreigners complaining of racist treatment and discrimination at the workplace or public offices.

Experts say that if understanding and consensus about a multicultural society fail to take root, you could see the appearance even in Korea of “skinheads” like those in Europe who target foreigners with violence. Government measures are needed, they say.

Marmot’s Note: Very sensitive issue, and one of which I am of two minds. On one hand, the authorities looked the other way while companies imported large numbers of foreigners from developing nations to do “the work Koreans wouldn’t do,” which seems to be code for “the work for which legal citizens and residents of Korea would ask too much to do.” Anyway, suffice it say that there are a lot of parties at fault for the illegal immigration mess — government, employees and the illegal migrants themselves — and to impute blame only on one side is both unjust and won’t fix the problem.

That said, wanting your nation to enforce its own immigration laws is not “xenophobia”… although I have no doubt that many of the posters at the cited websites are xenophobic.

As for government measures to allow understanding and consensus about multiculturalism to take root, I suggest the government first begin be asking Koreans if they even WANT to become a multicultural society. There really has never been a real debate on this issue, despite tons of ink spilled in the papes about “Korea’s growing multicultural society.” Do Koreans want to import significant numbers of foreigners? If so, how many, and from where? Should the emphasis be on “multiculturalism” or assimilation? Multiculturalism — to the extent that it’s happening in Korea — has been happening ad hoc due to pressing economic and social needs (cheap labor, foreign wives) without, IMHO, sufficient contemplation of its long-term implications. The experts are right — if there’s no consensus or well-conceived government immigration and social policy, you could see skinheads, just as you could see the appearence of “French suburbs.”

About 10% of the students in Seoul-area foreign schools are Koreans, reports Yonhap. In fact, at some foreign schools, the student body is 30—60% Korean.

Seoul councilwoman Lee Su-jeong of the Democratic Labor Party said during an administrative investigation of Seoul Office of Education that some US-owned foreigner schools had become “royal academies” for the children of wealthy Koreans. In the case of Seoul Academy International School, she said, 60% of the students were Korean.

According to Seoul Office of Education data, as of March, the US-owned Seoul Academy International School had the highest percentage of Korean students — 101 of 166 students.

No. 2 was the French Lycée international Xavier (43.2%), followed by US-owned Asia Pacific International School (36.6%), Korea International School (30.8%) and Centennial Christian School (27.9%).

Of a total 5,573 students at Seoul-area foreign schools, 503 — or 9.0% — were Korean.

Of the foreign schools running courses K thru 12, the expensive US-owned schools charged about 10—12.8 million won a year as of March.

To boost the educational environment for resident foreigners, the city is pushing plans to establish additional foreign schools in three areas — Banpo-dong, the DMC in Sangam-dong and Gaepo-dong. For the project, the city has set aside 154.4 billion won for next year alone.

Needless to say, Lee was less than happy with this, explaining that since Koreans who have lived more than five years overseas or had foreign residency could enrol, local foreign schools had become “royal academies” for the kids of rich Koreans. “Seoul City must completely withdraw its plan, which wastes taxpayer money, to establish new foreign schools,” she said.

About this, a city official said a presidential order limiting Korean enrolment in foreign schools to 30% would soon go into effect, and that they would use that basis to set up new foreign schools that prioritise foreign students. He said they’d word so that the schools lead to foreign investment.

Marmot’s Note: I don’t know as much about this issue as I probably should, but it does seem odd that the city would spend taxpayer money to help set up private schools for rich folk.