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The Reconsideration of Lee Gap Sung's Life afterIndependence of Korea

HUH DONGHYUN 1

1경희대학교

Candidate

ABSTRACT

This paper examines why Lee Gap Sung has been chastised as "a Japanese collaborator" by striking a secret deal to be a Japanese spy under the disguise of a independence fighter, which was suggested by the time he was about to inaugurate as president of the Association of Independence Fighters in 1965. However, he was one of the representatives in the March 1st Independence Movement, jailed for nine years under the Japanese rule, and continued to resist against the Japanese colonialism to the end. Accordingly, it was found out that 1) there are serious problems in credibility of newspaper articles, journal writings, and works on Japanese collaborators, which claimed that he was a Japanese collaborator and problematized his life after the Liberation. Even scholars who advocate the historical justification of liquidating the past crimes of the Japanese collaborators attest that those reportages are doubtful; 2) It appears that the controversy over his being a Japanese collaborator stemmed from the conflicts between the conservative and progressive groups after the collapse of the era of the Cold War. Especially, given his contribution to the establishment of the regimes of both Rhee Seung Man and Park Jung Hee, his status as the only survivor among the 33 representatives after Oh Se Chang's death in 1953, and as president of the Association of Independence Fighters, which represents the independence movement in line with nationalism, he was a symbolic barometer to measure the historical legitimacy of the two regimes. Thus, he appeared to be constantly accused of being "a Japanese spy". That is because his being a Japanese collaborator would be firm evidence that the two regimes which appointed him as a ranking individual were anti-nationalistic governments; 3) However, the researcher does not have any intention to defend Lee Gap Sung who made a negative influence on democracy in Korea as a politician who contributed to Rhee's civil authoritarianism and Park's military authoritarianism. Instead, it is to reveal that the very reasons to propagandize the data against Lee with no credibility and critical analysis are due to the historical consciousness based on the master discourse of “nationalism” and “the populace” and the groups who want to take advantage of such confrontations.

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