Inter-Korean People-to-People Diplomacy: Social and Cultural Exchanges across the 38th Parallel

What is it about?

People-to-people exchanges between South and North Koreans remain very restricted and under scrutiny of both governments. In this article, we map the South Korean government’s theories of change regarding inter-Korean exchanges, focusing on South Korea’s problem framing, intervention framing, methods and intended outcomes. We use primary archival documents including unification white papers, policy papers, reports and presidents’ speeches. We also conducted elite interviews with Ministry of Unification bureaucrats in order to better understand the historical and political context of archival documents. We also explored the outcomes of inter-Korean exchanges, building on subjective insights and observations of South Koreans who participated in these exchanges. Our findings suggest that the primary goals of inter-Korean social and cultural exchanges were to expand points of contact between the two Koreas to alleviate the sense of mutual alienation and antagonism, and to increase mutual understanding and empathy between the two societies in order to reduce tensions and establish peace on the Korean Peninsula. South Korean participant interviews reveal that direct interpersonal interaction between South and North Koreans reinforces the idea of a superordinate Korean group identity, however imagined it may be.

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