Taiwan and Korea: Colonial Experience and Resistance

The lapse of time covered by Japan’s imperialism has had a notable impact on many Asian civilizations since the nineteenth century. As a matter of fact, even today the years of colonization at the hand of Japan keep on shaping and influencing the relationship between the offended countries and their former colonizers, deeply. Most striking, is the case of South Korea’s conflicting relationship with Japan; a relationship that, no matter the passing of time, just cannot seem to be mended, even with a strong ally such as the United States acting as a mediator between the two of them. On the other hand, other former colonies such as Taiwan still entertain friendly relations with Japan, even with the colonial past weighing on their shared history. The main goal of this thesis will be to understand the reasons why Taiwan and Korea – two civilizations who share an extremely similar colonial history, and whose territory was occupied by the same aggressor – share entirely different views on their experience with Japanese colonialism, and had two entirely different responses to it. Through a deep analysis on the academic literature related to both Korean and Taiwan’s state of civilization before and during the colonial period, the goal will be to understand not only the impact of the colonial policies that were applied in the colonies throughout the years, but especially how Japanese colonization shaped the identity of the people inhabiting those countries and the relationship between colonized and colonizers.