PROBLEMS IN EXISTING STUDIES

THE MARCH FIRST Movement was one of the most significant incidents during the Japanese colonial period, in that it was an anti-Japanese nationalist movement of the largest scale. It was also one of the most significant incidents in the history of Korean international relations in this period. This kind of understanding has never truly taken root in Korean academia, perhaps because very little research on the international relations of Korea's colonial period has ever been completed. This is partially understandable, given that the “Korean question” had disappeared from East Asian international politics by its annexation in 1910. Upon the outbreak of the March uprising of 1919, the powers began to reconsider the issue. They also returned to it toward the end of World War II, examining Korea's potential liberation and independence by making reference to peaceful demonstrations, the courage and sacrifice of the Koreans, their ability to organize a nationwide movement, and the “Korean Provisional Government” (KPG); all things which had played their part in the movement that had surfaced more than two decades earlier.

Before we discuss the main topic, it is useful to review the present state of studies on this subject, with a particular emphasis on the role of foreign factors in the movement. Save in certain cases, studies on the uprising have focused on domestic factors in terms of its outbreak, development and outcomes. This contributed to studies on the political, economic, social and cultural aspects of colonial Korea, and shed light on topics such as changes in Korean society, Japan's colonial policy, the problem of tradition, and modernization. Yet it is true that the excessive emphasis on domestic (and hence nationalistic) factors may have distorted and narrowed the historical significance of the March First Movement. This approach tends to downplay claims that the influence of foreign factors, including President Wilson's call for the self-determination of peoples, played a substantial part in the movement (at least in its early stages), while highlighting instead the “national capacity” of Koreans to organize and stage resistance. The theory posits that the self-determination of peoples in itself lacked the power to ignite such large-scale demonstrations for independence by a weak, colonized people.