Jong Chol An - "Contested Memory of Imperial Korea: The Post-1945 Controversy over Royal Properties in South Korea"

Jong Chol An, Research Fellow at East Rock Institute

This presentation considers perceptions of “tradition” in South Korea by examining the fate of the Korean Empire (1897-1910)’s crown land. Since Imperial Korea’s ruling house, the Chosŏn dynasty (1392-1910) is the last royal dynasty in Korean history, most Koreans tend to regard it as something of the “tradition.” Under the Chosŏn dynasty, the landholdings of the royal house and the government were not clearly differentiated until 1895 when the Korean government under the Japanese sway instituted a clear delineation of the boundary. Upon proclamation by Emperor Kojong (r. 1897-1907; previously king since 1864) as a part of his modernization program for Korea, the new classification also increased the amount of royal estate. 

Taking over Korea as a protectorate in 1905, the Japanese sought to decrease the size of crown land. Subsequently, after formally annexing Korea as a colony in 1910, Japan vested a large amount of royal family land, soon taken over by the Oriental Development Company. Nonetheless, the Department of Yi Royal Household (Yiwangjik) under the colonial government still managed over 2.5 million acres land. 

When the Japanese colonial rule ended in 1945, in southern Korea occupied by the U.S., management of the remaining crown land was transferred to the United States Army Military Government in Korea (USAMGIK, 1945-48). When the Republic of Korea was inaugurated in 1948, the former royal land became an issue laden with political, ideological, and economic implications. Appreciating its immense property value, the first president, Syngman Rhee (in office 1948-60) did not allow Imperial Prince Yeong, a younger brother of the last emperor of Korea and heir to the throne, to return to Korea from Japan. Treating the former crown land as government properties, the Rhee regime sold most of it to its political supporters, including many businessmen. The effort by the short-lived, succeeding democratic administration of President Yun Po-sun (1960-62) to investigate irregularities in the liquidation process was in vain, as what apparently was an arson’s fire destroyed relevant government records. Under the succeeding regime of President Park Chung-hee (1963-1979), the arbitrary liquidation by the state continued. While preventing the restoration of monarchy, both Rhee and Park actively utilized symbolic power of the Chosŏn Dynsaty for political agendas and economic development. Today what still remains of the former crown land is managed by the Cultural Heritage Administration.  

The complex history of former crown land has several consequences. First, since what remains of the former crown land is mostly of royal palaces in Seoul, in population imagination, royal “tradition” has crystallized as palace properties. Second, as Sookmyung Women’s University property and other cases show, several plots of former royal land are in legal dispute since Imperial Korea’s royal house had leased them to various educational and medical institutions for free and “for eternity” in the early twentieth century. Third, since the Japanese colonial state had abolished various old forms of land tenure such as Imperial Korea’s perpetual tenure, South Korea now has only has two types of land ownership-that is public (government) and private. Accordingly since the Korean War (1950-1953), the South Korean government has liquidated the former crown land with little challenge of opposition.