This paper explores how perceptions of socioeconomic inequality, attitudes about redistribution, and experiences of social upward mobility shape the level of participation in political protests. The dramatic widening of income inequality in Korean society since the 2007 financial breakdown and the new surge of political protests has continued to attract attention. However, scholars have not clearly examined how Korean views about socioeconomic inequality and redistribution affect political activism in protests. This study reflects on the hypotheses of the grievance theory and the resource theory, and investigates survey data to explore whether dissatisfaction with inequality and attitudes about redistribution have a systematic impact on the level of political activism in protests. Using data from the 2009 South Korea Social Survey Program, this study concludes that dissatisfaction with income disparity, dissatisfaction with educational inequality, and redistributive preferences, have a systematic impact in fostering active political engagement in protests.
Despite the wave of scholarly enthusiasm over the rising number of foreigners and migrants in Korean society, the public’s side of the story has not been clearly articulated. Against this background, this article – guided by ideas of the symbolic politics and the utilitarian politics approaches – taps into survey data to fully investigate the demand side of determinants contributing to the popular disapproval of the rise of immigrants. Unlike other studies, this article finds that individual immigration preferences reflect multifaceted utilitarian calculus and symbolic predispositions. While affective orientations toward multiculturalism and assimilation ideology influence public attitudes toward immigration policy, scholars have downplayed utilitarian self-interest induced immigration attitudes. Ordered Logit analysis of 2003 Korean National Identity Survey data demonstrates a link between an individual’s utilitarian interests and immigration preference. This analysis suggests that concerns over job security drive negative attitudes regarding the increase of immigrant inflows. Low-skilled respondents are more likely to prefer restricting the rise of migrants. Second, perceived cultural threats are related to negative views toward newcomers. Those supporting multiculturalism are inclined to support increasing immigration. These findings suggest that the factors driving immigration preferences are multifaceted.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.