[Democracy Cooperation] Korea Democracy Storytelling Interview IV. Possibilities for International Solidarity of Korean Democracy

YouTube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHEWC628Mds

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The East Asia Institute (EAI), with the support of the National Democratic Institute (NDI), conducted an interview with Seo Soo-yeon, Team Leader of the Asia Democracy Network (ADN), as part of the Korea Democracy Storytelling project launched in July 2020. The interview, approximately 10 minutes long, covers the activities of the Asia Democracy Network, promoting the participation of Koreans in democracy solidarity activities within the international community, potential areas for Korea's contribution to international solidarity activities, and ways to promote international solidarity activities among Korean youth. This interview video was produced in English with Korean subtitles to widely disseminate the case and lessons of Korean democracy domestically and internationally.

Video Transcript

uh so i'll introduce myself first my name is sue sa and i'm the program manager at the asia democracy network and i'm mostly responsible for implementing and managing the secretariat here in south korea and to kind of explain what the asia democracy network does we're a regional network of networks so what that means is we have members who are networks across asia that work on human rights elections migrants minority rights all these different thematic sectors and all these different thematic sector networks are our members

and what it's a network of network under the umbrella of democracy what we do is break down silos and really work together to advocate and promote democracy in asia um so i grew up in the united states and i've only been in korea for about eight nine years so i can't fully understand all dynamics of korean society but based on my time here and my observations and observations through the work that i do which is um you know implementing advocacy campaigns and uh for asia uh you know issues uh what i found was

i think there's a lack of understanding for you know democracy promotion by koreans and the reason being is when you hear about international advocacy in korea it's mostly development corporation so we see a lot of you know the korean people are not exposed to uh you know advocacy or international campaigns rather when it comes to international solidarity it only boils down to providing infrastructure assistance creating roads and infrastructure inside countries in asia so it i think that's a big reason why

and also there's a huge lack of funding for civil society in korea to work on international solidarity work so it's hard for them to engage in campaigns to do democracy promotion or international solidarity because they just don't have access to funds to it and lastly uh the most thing that i see that it lacks is there's not enough education on democracy and human rights among the general public so when people are you know asked about human rights or democracy about other countries or korea they shy away from it because it's

such a very difficult topic it's it comes to them very um as something very difficult to understand very foreign so i think it's it's a lack of education there that you know brings people not not to be very engaged in the issues korea has such a rich history of democracy movements starting from way back from the tonghak revolution the guangzhou uprising the 1987 democracy movement and even recently a couple of years ago the candlelight movement korea has such a rich story and narrative about how the people came together to

fight for their rights and that is something in all those revolutions and movements are relevant today in other parts of asia and a lot of places like hong kong cambodia indonesia they're all going through these movements now and korea has that experience and rich history that could be shared throughout the region and if not throughout the world i think korean youth are very passionate and they're very i don't think they're apathetic they are very well aware of the issues and want to be in solidarity with

other movements and issues but i think there's just not enough opportunity so i see a very huge gap in connecting activists from hong kong cambodia philippines to the youth of korea so if there's more effort and opportunities given to youth in south korea to connect with these other activists all across the world i think the you know solidarity would be would be endless would be great i think this is such a great initiative about democracy storytelling that the aia is pursuing because as i mentioned in my previous

answer korea has such a great democracy story to tell and a lot of you know activists in other countries right now really look towards korea to gain uh knowledge from the experience um i remember uh you know i worked um you know with the night uh with the protests that broke out last year in hong kong and one of the most requests that i received working at adn was from hong kong activists wanting to learn more wanting to connect with the activists of the candlelight revolution here in south korea and they wanted to learn

how you know how it was possible for koreans to come together peacefully and protest for you know over five six months and achieve what uh we achieve so there's a lot of information to share and experience to share and i think we should really work more on sharing our story and connecting with the activists in asia to spread our knowledge thank you