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played to signal the official end of the workday, but unlike some of their Western counterparts, employees made no mad dash for the door. Women usually continued working for another hour or so, while the majority of the male employees worked for two or three more hours. The few people who left the office at “quitting time” invariably had a special reason for leaving and did so only after clearing it with their superiors.
The reputation of the chaebol reached a low point in the 1970s and 1980s, particularly among their own employees. Union agitation and strikes increased. A number of the conglomerates created special strike forces called kusadae (kuu-sah-day), or “save the company corps,” made up of tough young men the companies used to physically break up strikes and other union activities.
Still, university graduates were so anxious to obtain employment with one of the chaebol that they would take the entrance exams of several firms in the hope of being accepted by at least one of them. This resulted in the government’s ordering the conglomerates to hold their ipsa sihom (eep-sah she-hohm), or “entrance examinations,” on the same day so that graduates from the most prestigious and best schools could not monopolize the available jobs. Smaller companies held their entrance exams on a later date. Candidates who passed the entrance exams then had to pass rigorous personal interviews that were designed to weed out prospects who did not meet the character and personality standards of the companies concerned.
By the early 1990s the chaebol had matured and reformed their managerial practices to the point that their labor problems had disappeared. They had also grown to the point that it was difficult to buy any domestically manufactured or imported item that had not been touched by one of the combines. The names of the leading groups had also become well known around the world. But in 1995 the close ties between the conglomerates and the government suddenly came to a head. President Young Sam Kim ordered the arrest of his two immediate predecessors, Doo Hwan Chun and Tae Woo Roh, on bribery charges, and implicated twenty-four of the country’s top chaebol in payoffs to the former presidents. Government officials were quick to point out, however, that they had no intention of dismantling the conglomerates because that would cripple the economy. They said their purpose in calling in and interrogating the leaders of the twenty-four chaebol was to impress on them the importance of their voluntarily reducing their role and power in the economy—something that, in keeping with their dedication to the well-being of the nation, most of them agreed to do.
In chaebol jargon, the founder company is often referred to as moche (moach-eh), or “the mother company,” while subsidiaries are often called chamae hoesa (chah-my hoh-eh-sah), or “sister companies.”
There was to be an even more serious downside to the rapid growth the chaebol had relentlessly pursued for more than three decades. In 1997 their overextended financial obligations caught up with them, and several of them went bankrupt—something that had been virtually inconceivable to Koreans up to that time.
However, by the year 2000 leading chaebol like LG, Samsung, and Hyundai had become global conglomerates, ranking among the world’s largest and best-known enterprises.
Chaegim 책임 Chay-geem
Dealing with Responsibility
Korea’s traditional culture precluded the development of individualism and a sense of self. The Confucian system of filial piety and familism required that the self and the individual be merged into the family collective. Centuries of conditioning in the concept and practice of collective identity as opposed to individual identity resulted in Koreans’ failing to develop a clear sense of personal chaegim (chay-geem), or “responsibility.”
Chaegim was seen as a family or collective thing, not as a personal or individual matter. The father and family as a whole were responsible for the attitudes and conduct of each individual member, particularly when the conduct was regarded as immoral or disruptive. When a member of a family committed a crime or transgression against someone else or against government authorities, the whole family was considered guilty and was subject to punishment.
The demands on the “collective character” of individuals eventually became so strong that the personal pronoun I was seldom used. Koreans typically thought and spoke in terms of we, not I. In this environment, people generally did not think in terms of personal responsibility.
Present-day Koreans are still being culturally programmed in the concept of family-centered collective responsibility, but not nearly as much as in the past. At the same time, they are also being taught to develop individual chaegim, particularly in high-tech, highly competitive businesses, where the ideas and efforts of individuals acting on their own can make the difference between success and failure. This does not mean, however, that foreigners dealing with Koreans in business or in politics can automatically expect individual Koreans either to act on their own or to take personal responsibility for projects—or even their own actions.
Chaegim in Korean enterprises and institutions continues to be far more collective than it is in their Western counterparts. The Western practice of identifying and dealing with the “man in charge” often does not work in Korea. Typically there is no single individual company member who is directly and exclusively in charge of a particular matter. It is a section or group responsibility. There is usually a person in sections and divisions who has been designated as the “window” to the outside world. But he or she is generally an extension of the group and cannot act alone.
However, there are very conspicuous exceptions to the rule of divided responsibility in Korean companies that are still being run by their founders as well as in family-owned and operated companies. In fact there is a specific shijo (she-joe), or “company founder,” syndrome in Korea that played a significant role in South Korea’s rapid development into an economic powerhouse. Most Koreans who founded companies between 1945 and around 1970 were totally traditional (Confucian) in their attitudes and behavior, meaning that they looked on their employees as family members who were expected to show them the utmost respect and obey them absolutely.
These company founders typically worked seventy to eighty hours a week and expected the same of their employees. They ran their companies like feudal kingdoms, delegating very little authority to their subordinates. But anytime a company failed, all of the employees got a share of the blame—a factor that scholar-essayist Kyu Tae Yi explains in The Shape of Korean Life. He notes that when things are going well, Koreans who are involved in any way characteristically claim as much of the credit as possible, but when things go wrong they typically blame others.
In present-day Korea, managers of departments and divisions in larger companies typically give an impression of authority and power because they are almost always surrounded by a retinue of aides who respond to their orders like well-drilled military teams. But this impression is usually deceiving. For the most part these managers can act only after arriving at a consensus with a number of other managers. Adds H. J. Chang, president of SEMCO International, a leading consulting firm in Seoul, “There is, however, a slow but nevertheless discernible shift toward the Western way of decision-making by individuals.”
Although Koreans are assuming more and more personal responsibility for their actions in family as well as business affairs, there is little likelihood that collectivism will disappear entirely from the culture in the foreseeable future. Sharing responsibility is deeply embedded in the Korean character. They are acutely conscious of the fact that if a society is to survive and prosper in a harmonious environment, individualism must inevitably give way to group responsibility. They are not likely to discard that hard-earned wisdom.
Chae-myun 체면 Chay-me’yuun
Saving Everybody’s Face
At the beginning of Korea’s Choson dynasty in 1392 the new government strengthened the divisions between the already segregated social classes by making a much sterner version of Confucianism the national political ideology as well as the state religion. The government made the system work by imbuing its religious aspects with a cultlike status that conditioned people mentally and physically to behave according to a precise etiquette and by severely punishing any dissent.
Since this system made a carefully prescribed etiquette the essence of morality while also providing the social factors that gave people identity based