hankyoreh

which acquiesced to a government order to revise their version of a high school history textbook

In an unprecedented development, the government has succeeded in ordering five publishing companies to revise the high school history textbook “A Modern and Contemporary History of Korea,” a textbook that the ministry had approved for use under the previous administration. The latest in a series of controversial moves initiated by the ministry to pressure educators to use its preferred textbook has educators and education officials claiming that the ministry is trying to gain control over education while implementing a conservative curriculum.

Five publishing companies, under pressure from the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, which authorizes and approves textbooks, said they will accept the ministry’s demands and “revise all of their history textbooks.” Previously, when the ministry had asked the publishing companies to revise the textbooks, the companies responded by asking the textbook writers to decide whether they would accept the demand.

The textbook writers objected, accusing the ministry of pressuring the publishing companies, which do not own the textbook copyrights. The ministry’s policy, they said, was unfair because the ministry was trying pass to the companies the political and legal burden of making revisions, canceling the ministry’s prior authorization of the books and discontinuing the books’ publication. If the ministry goes ahead with the revisions, the writers say they will take legal action.

On Sunday, the ministry said that five publishing companies said they would revise the textbooks: Kumsung Publishing Co., Doosan Corp., Bubmunsa, Joongang Institute for Better Education and Chunjae Education. The ministry said it would work with the publishing companies on specific revisions to their textbooks.

On Friday, the ministry reported that it had sent an official letter to the five publishing companies on October 30 requesting that they make revisions to 55 points in the textbooks. Some of the publishing companies responded they would make revisions to 26 of the points on the list. However, the ministry found this unsatisfactory and sent another official letter ordering the companies to revise the remaining 29 points on the list as well as other points they had found to be insufficient.

In a telephone interview with The Hankyoreh, Kim In-ho, the president of Kumsung Publishing Co,, which was ordered to revise 38 points in its version of the textbook, said, “I have no choice but to regard the ministry’s order for revisions as compulsory under the law. There is no room for other choices.” Kim said, “As the chief executive of a company with some 4,500 employees, I made a painful decision because managing the company has become difficult due to the textbook issue. I have apologized for scarring the writers and will take legal and moral responsibility” for the decision.

Textbook writers, history teachers and historians urged the government to stop pressuring the publishing companies to make revisions and to stop pressuring schools to alter their textbooks, saying that in education, in which students should be taught to become democratic citizens, undemocratic things are happening as though there were nothing wrong.

In a joint statement released Sunday, six writers of the Kumsung version of the book, titled “A Modern and Contemporary History of Korea,” including Kim Han-jong, a professor of history education at Korea National University of Education, said, “Nobody can accept having a publisher unilaterally change the contents of a book that will have the name of the writer printed on it. It violates the copyright law and significantly undermines the writer’s honor.”

The group says they will take legal action, adding that the Education Ministry should take responsibility for its “disgraceful” behavior in pressing for the revisions and its involvement in pressuring high school principals to choose its preferred version of the history textbook.

Yun Jong-bae, president of the Association of Korean History Teachers, said, “As I watch the government mobilize various forces to achieve its goal of revising the history textbooks and getting schools to select different textbooks, regardless of the chaos it causes, it looks like a military operation. My heart bleeds as the government goes ahead like this, even though historians at home and abroad and history teachers and graduate students in the field of history have raised their voices against the textbook revision.”

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