2. CHOSON SOCIAL HIERARCHY:
SOCIAL STATUSES
ROYAL HOUSE
YANGBAN
CHUNGIN (“middle people”)
•petty bureaucrats, skilled technicians, physicians, etc. under the employment of the
state
•often required to pass examination (chapgwa) on practical knowledge
SANGMIN (commoners)
•peasants, artisans, merchants, laborers, etc.
CHEONMIN (“vulgar commoners”; outcaste)
•slaves, servants, butchers, entertainers, shamans, prostitutes, jailkeepers, courtesans,
etc.
3. REFORM CONTINUES:
REVOLUTION OF THE 16TH C.
15th C.: Hungu (“Old Merit Subject”) School of scholar-officials
dominate Choson politics and reforms
Supporters of Yi Sung-gye and early monarchs
Received titles and lands as reward for their support
16th C.: Emergence of Sa!im (“Mountain and Forrest”) or
Sarim (“Scholar and Forrest”) School
4. EMERGENCE OF THE SARIM
SCHOOL, 16TH C.
Scholars who had been away from the seat of power during
the first century of the Choson Dynasty
Dedicated neo-Confucian researchers, writers, and
reformers
Initially defeated by the Hungu elites
Becomes the driving force that completes the
Confucianization of Choson
5. EMERGENCE OF “FACTIONS,” LATE 16TH C.
Represented lines of political differences based on different
ideological bases
Differences in opinions regarding internal and foreign
policies, royal successions and rituals
Political dynamics based on debates and competitions
Central feature in Choson aristocratic politics
6. “FACTIONS,” LATE 16TH - 17TH C.:
“FOUR COLORS”
“Easterners” v. “Westerners”
emerged out of a dispute over appointments of influential posts in
government in the late 16th C.
“Easterners” divided into “Northerners” and “Southerners” over a
dispute over selecting heir to the throne
Subgroups within major factions
By mid-17th C.: Noron (“Old Doctrine”), Soron (“Young Doctrine”),
Northerners, and Southerners
emerged out of foreign policy disputes
7. FACTIONALISM: SUCCESS OR FAILURE?
“Success”: political mechanism based on competition among rival
factions?
through competition and debates over policy implements, allowed
changes and reforms to continue
political and ideological debates allowed vibrant scholarly research
and intellectual engagement among Confucian elites
prevented one group from dominating the bureaucracy for a long
time
“Failure”: political bickering among factions left the country
unprepared for massive foreign invasions?
8. NEO-CONFUCIAN REVOLUTION:
A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE
Movements to reshape every institution and custom to match orthodoxy
The Shi’a movement of the Safavids in Persia, late 15th-16th C.
The Wahhabi movement of 18th C. Arabia
The Fulani Jihad of West Africa, early 18th C.
Medieval Christianity and Reformation religious reforms in Europe
Difference: Choson Neo-Confucian reforms lacked militancy of Christian
and Muslim reformers in imposing total orthodoxy of belief and practice
9. STATE OF CHOSON’S MILITARY READINESS IN
THE EVE OF HIDEYOSHI’S INVASION
Choson Army heavily unmanned and undertrained in the
face of the Japanese invasion
Main military forces concentrated in Seoul to protect the
capital
Creation of the Border Defense Command to deal with
Japanese pirate attacks, 1522
Proposals for military build-up defeated in the late 16th C.
Yi I’s 1583 proposal for raising 100,000 troops unheeded
amid factional struggles
10. WHY WERE CHOSON NOT READY
FOR WAR?
2 centuries of peace and internal stability without major
warfare
Security achieved through the tribute system and border
control rather than armed struggles with foreign states
More social privilege given to the scholarly rank of the
bureaucracy: less emphasis on military
Emphasis and reliance on military technology rather than
maintenance of a large standing army
11. KOREA-JAPAN RELATIONS BEFORE IMJIN WAR
Japanese Piratical Wars
large-scale pirate raids and warfare on Korean shores from
1350 to 1392
378 piratical attacks by 756,000 armed organized pirates
on Koryo Korea between 1375 and 1388
Scale and destruction larger than Imjin War (1592-1598)
12. DOUBLE-EDGED POLICY IN EARLY CHOSON
Naval attacks on militant pirates, 15th C.
“Pacification”
Regulation of private traders and envoys of power groups
from Japan
By 1414, representatives of Shogunate steward families
allowed in Korea
Tsushima as the middleman
13. KOREA-JAPAN RELATIONS BEFORE THE WAR
Japanese allowed in designated trade ports (mainly Busan)
and confined in areas known as waegwan (“Japanese
House”)
Choson court sent periodic missions to Japan, but did not
recognize Japan as a bonafide member of the tribute system
Choson court finally made aware of the impending Japanese
invasion after the return of all Japanese in waegwan to Japan
in 1592
14. THE “IMJIN WAR”
Hideyoshi’s first invasion of Choson,
1582-1583
Rapid advance of Japanese army
Factions divided in responding to the
invasion and the process for
requesting troops from the Ming
Ming military intervention delayed
due to its own border problems and
internal political conflicts
15. A WAR OF ATTRITION, 1592-1598
Ming forces push Japanese forces back
Prolonged stalemate led to a greater emphasis on peace negotiation
Choson resistance forces led by local Yangban clan leaders
Korean naval victories
Japanese withdrawal and second failed invasion (1587-88)
16. AFTERMATH OF THE IMJIN WAR
2 million lives lost
disruption of agricultural production
took a century to reach full recovery
financing the war and postwar recovery drains state treasury
destruction of infrastructure, cultural artifacts, historical
documents, etc.
korean artisans, artists, and laborers taken to Japan: cultural
diffusion
19. RISE OF THE MANCHUS
The Ming court’s demand for military assistance against the
Manchus, 1616: Choson’s tributary obligation
King Kwanghaegun’s unsuccessful policy of neutrality
Kwangaegun overthrown by pro-Ming political elites
Pro-Ming faction provokes Nurhaci’s invasion of Choson,
1627
Hong Taiji’s invasion of Choson to secure southern flank
against the Ming, 1636
20. A NEW WORLD ORDER IN EAST ASIA
The second Manchu invasion (“Pyongja War”), 1636-37 ends
in Korean defeat
Choson enters the Qing tributary system, 1644
Hostility toward the Manchus remains strong
Choson elites unwilling to acknowledge the “legitimacy” of
the Qing Dynasty
King Hyojong’s “northern expedition” plan to attack the
Qing, 1680s (never materialized)
