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- Title
A Critical Argument against the Thesis of "Individualization without Individualism": Focusing on a Comparison between Germany's Sonderweg and South Korea's Special Path to Modernization.
- Authors
Chan-Sook HONG
- Abstract
The Korean sociologist Chang Kyung-Sup coined the terms "compressed modernity" and "individualization without individualism" to describe the special path to modernisation in South Korea. The word "compressed" here denotes and emphasizes the contradictory coexistence of a collectivistic culture offamilism and family formations that are simultaneously individualizing and varying. Because South Korean women have initiated the individualization of family forms, Chang and Song characterize them as "stranded individualizers under compressed modernity," by which they mean that Korean women are culturally still collectivistic but at the same time appear individualistic in their (non-)marriage behaviour. This study argues against the theory of "compressed modernity" in Korea, according to which the individualization of families is nothing but a risk-averse variant offamilism. Instead, this study argues that the real dynamic of individualization in Korea is found in the emergence of individualism and its vulnerability to institutions offamilism. This study labels such a dynamic "compressed individualization.".
- Subjects
SOUTH Korea; SOUTH Korean social conditions; WOMEN
- Publication
Korea Journal, 2017, Vol 57, Issue 2, p102
- ISSN
0023-3900
- Publication type
Article
- DOI
10.25024/kj.2017.57.2.102