[KS] Egypt and Gwangju 1980

[don kirk]

Who said "influence?" -- does that word appear in my post? The point is simply 
to note the Egyptian revolution calls to mind others over the past half century. 
'Nuff said. As for "action" and "models," those are words for political 
scientists, but I never regarded politics as a science anyway. (Plain vanilla 
history was hard enough.) 

Re the question about the Egypt-Orascom-NKorea link, here are links to three 
pieces I did a week or so ago on that very topic. (We may be fairly certain the 
Orascom connection will survive -- as for military dealings, we'll have to wait 
and see. Sorry, no "models" to cite.)

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Korea/MB09Dg01.html

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-Pacific/2011/0207/Why-Kim-Jong-il-wished-Egypt-s-Mubarak-a-Happy-New-Year


http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/south-korea/110207/north-korea-egypt-kim-jong-il-naguib-sawaris


Don Kirk




________________________________
From: Frank Hoffmann <hoffmann at koreaweb.ws>
To: Korean Studies Discussion List <koreanstudies at koreaweb.ws>
Sent: Sun, February 13, 2011 12:22:42 PM
Subject: Re: [KS] Egypt and Gwangju 1980

Hello All:

> Not to mention Indonesia 1966-67 ("Year of Living Dangerously"), Philippines 
>Jan-Feb 1986 ("People Power"), Tiananmen Square Beijing 1989, and, who would 
>forget, Korea June 1987 (Democracy constitution), to name a few I've seen and/or 
>written about.


And those are all *related* in the sense of giving some sort of clear incentive 
to the next movements elsewhere, to be inflammatory in one way or the other? I 
would not believe that for a moment. Not that you need to care about my 
believes. But I just wonder if there is no convincing model out there for what 
was and is happening to late 20ths and early 21st century countries, those 
countries that were not too long ago called "third world countries" or periphery 
countries. This can't simply be some sort of "action" chain that then, were what 
happens in one country, years later (!), is supposed to have "influenced" 
movements in another country. Maybe political science can do better than 
suggesting such kind of action chains, no? What's "influence" anyway, other than 
a "wrong-headed grammatical prejudice about who is the agent and who the 
patient," as a British art historian put it--isn't that also very true for 
politics and everything else under the sun?

Is anyone in political science or economics or history aware of a convincing 
model that explains this?

Furthermore, I am very suspicious when reading about such lines of 
action/influence, starting with the Kwangju Unrest in May 1980. Who is the 
source of such claims? Anyone in those OTHER mentioned countries that are listed 
as having been "influenced" (Philippines, Burma, China ...)?

ADD-ON question:
Hasn't Egypt money been the very source of pretty much every single business and 
educational project of the past few years in North Korea (also all important 
high tech projects)? Anyone has any knowledge or good idea what will now happen 
to those projects? And if that will possibly be like a second Fall of the Wall 
effect for the North Korean state? (This is really just a question, based on 
speculation. Please don't mistake it as information.)

Thanks!

Best
Frank



-- --------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreaweb.ws
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