Next Wednesday, November 20, 2019, Prof. An Jong-Chol from the University of Tübingen will give a lecture on the history of land expropriation in Korea. Land expropriations took place under Japan's colonial rule from 1911 to 1941 (Compulsory Purchase of Land Act), mainly in what is now North Korea, with the justification of the country's economic development. Land expropriation also occurred in South Korea in the postwar years to build up the economy. It was not until the democratization process of the late 1980s that it became possible for citizens to demand sufficient compensation from the government. Nevertheless, expropriations in the name of public interest continue to occur, meeting with fierce resistance from the population. Here, Prof. An will shed particular light on expropriations with regard to housing construction in metropolitan regions, a topic that is also highly topical in Germany. The lecture promises interesting insights into how the Republic of Korea deals with this exciting issue.
Wednesday, Nov. 20, 291, 6 p.m., East Asia Institute Honkong Room. The lecture will be given in English.
Potrait of Prof. An:
Jong-Chol An completed his doctorate degree in modern Korean history at the Seoul National University, Korea and obtained law degree at the University of Hawaii in Manoa, USA. He is a specialist in the field of historical relations between Korea and the USA, of Christianity in Korea, and of the history of Korean law. He has written American Missionaries and Korean-American Relations, 1931-1948: Withdrawal from Education Mission, Wartime Cooperation, and the American Military Administration (in Korean) as well as over twenty articles in Korean and English. Prof. An is currently working on the history of Korean law, with particular focus on the U.S. occupation of Korea and the era of the Cold War (1945-1953). He is particularly interested in the social change in Korea through law and society perspective.
From 2009 to 2011, Prof. An was a HK (Humanities Korea) Research Professor at Inha University. He is currently in editorial board of the Journal of Northeast Asian History (in English) and the Journal of Legal History (in Korean). He taught a broad number of BA and MA courses such as Modern Korean History and Law and Society in Korea in several universities in Korea.
Prof. An actively engages in projects that deal with the history of Korean law and the Cold War culture.