The purpose of this study is to expose the human rights violations caused by illegal or unjust exercise of state power in the area of social order maintenance, which has not been sufficiently discussed by previous studies on state violence, and shed light on how the criminal justice system operated in the process. In the latter half of the 20th century, Korea was governed by the authoritarian regimes with few means of protecting the human rights of the accused and other people involved in the criminal justice system. Social order maintenance policies often targeted lower classes in cities, and violated their human rights through unjust exercise of the state power. As the Year 1 of the three-year research project, this study looks into the crack down of gangsters and vagrants committed in the name of “elimination of the old evil” specified in the third paragraph of the May 16 Revolution Pledge immediately after the military coup in 1961, and the mobilization of labor pursued along with the crackdown.
This study looks into a series of projects and organizations under the national development policies in the 1960’s, including: the National Construction Projects, the Rehabilitation Construction Corps, the Rehabilitation Construction Youth Corps, and the Self-Help Settlement Projects. These projects used inmates at prison and juvenile detention centers, young men who did not fulfill their military duties, people with records of violence, and vagrants as mobilized labor. These projects were implemented in connection with the economic development plans and the national development plans in the 1960’s. In the 1960’s, the administration began to launch full-on development policies to build a foundation for the country’s industries starting with the 1st 5-Year Economic Development Plan in 1962. “Construction” was one of the mantras of the Park Chung-hee administration throughout the 1960’s. For example, in his presidential address in 1965, Park proposed “growth, export, and construction” as the three major goals of his administration. At the same time, the government utilized its police power to crack down vagrants and criminals including gangsters and pickpockets, and sent them to work in national construction projects and development projects in mountains and coastal areas. The majority of the mobilized labor consisted of disadvantaged members of the society characterized at the time as “gangsters” and “vagrants.” These people were arrested and put into labor by the administration as a part of its efforts to address the steep increase of vagrants in urban areas driven by the Korean War and the collapse of rural communities. The crackdown and mobilization were also motivated by “elimination of corruption and old evil,” a strategy which the military regime used to justify their rule.
The mobilization of labor for national development in the 1960’s was committed in multiple throngs. The 1961-1962 National Construction Corps used people arrested during the crack down on gangsters immediately following the May 16 coup in 1961, and the 1962 National Construction Corps mobilized young men who had not fulfilled their military duties. The 1968-1969 National Construction Corps relied on people arrested during a crackdown of violent criminals and other criminals. The Rehabilitation Construction Corps and the Rehabilitation Youth Construction Corps mobilized inmates at prisons and juvenile detention centers between 1967 and 1970, and Self-Help Settlement Projects mobilized orphans and vagrants for forced labor. Other than the Rehabilitation Construction Corps and the Rehabilitation Youth Construction Corps, which mobilized those already held at prisons and juvenile detention centers, the National Construction Corps and the Self-Help Settlement Project mobilized people for forced labor without any legal basis, and arrested people for being gangsters and vagrants even without clear proof that they broke the law. People were arrested, detained, and put into labor without legal basis or even warrant. At the camps, these laborers were exposed to violence and abuse, poor living and working conditions, and various diseases.
The National Construction Corps Projects began when the military regime took over the previous Democratic Party administration’s national construction projects. In 1960, the Democratic Party administration developed national construction projects, which were public civil engineering projects designed to absorb the unused labor from rural areas and unemployed persons in cities, thereby helping rural villages and unemployed people. The first National Construction Project under the military regime was launched in March 1961. However, while the Democratic Party’s plan was aimed at securing workforce through voluntary mobilization, the military regime sought to assign individuals arrested during crackdowns to the projects. Starting on May 24, 1961, under the “Elimination of Social Evil” policy, the government began to send arrested gangsters and other criminals to project sites. By 1962, at least 3,137 gangsters and pickpockets were put into labor at the road expansion sites around coal mines in Samcheok, Gangwon-do. The legal basis for this mobilization was belatedly established on December 13, 1961, with the enactment of the Act on Special Cases Concerning Arrest of Violent Criminals, Etc. This Act was a case of retroactive legislation to begin with. In addition, most of the forced laborers between 1961 and 1962 had been mobilized without due process under the Act.
Between 1968 and 1969, the administration launched national construction projects using a similar approach to the National Construction Corps operated immediately following the May 16 coup in 1961. To secure the workforce for the projects, the government assigned quotas to police stations and officers during the “special crackdown period,” which resulted in the police often relying on extreme measures to arrest suspects. In the process, many individuals were illegally arrested and forced to work in national construction projects even though their alleged violations had not been confirmed. The legal community and the press strongly criticized the practice for lacking legal basis and being unconstitutional. In response, the government belatedly attempted to propose a special act providing for security measures and amending the Act on Punishment of Violence, Etc. to create a legal basis for forced labor. However, the enactment and amendment never came to fruition due to strong criticism that they were highly unconstitutional.
The Self-Help Settlement Projects were aimed at relocating vagrants and other “problematic” individuals in urban areas to rural villages, where they would develop farmlands and contribute to food production. The 23 Self-Help Settlement Project sites in the 1960’s were located in areas with a lot of workable fields, forests, wastelands, and tidelands in Gangwon-do, Gyeongsangbuk-do, Jeollanam-do, and other regions. It has been found that at least 13,366 individuals were assigned to the project in the 1960’s. The targets mostly consisted of beggars, juvenile and adult vagrants, orphans, and ragpickers. The others included Hansen’s disease patients, inmates at rehabilitation centers, and even flood refugees. The project was implemented by the Ministry of Health and Society. Mobilization of laborers and on-site operations were entrusted to public-private organizations or private organizations. However, the police was involved in arresting and mobilizing the victims. The operation of the project itself was replete with corruption, including embezzlement of aid supplies and extortion. The sites operated in the style of a military camp, with the laborers subject to strict surveillance and incarceration. Laborers at Self-Help Settlement Project sites for farmland development were put into hard labor, and many of them died from landslide and drowning in the process. They also suffered from malnutrition because they were not supplied with sufficient food. In addition, some laborers under the Self-Help Settlement Projects were subject to forced marriage by the government. Into the mid-1960’s, many Self-Help Settlement Projects were discontinued for lack of aid to the projects. The projects were also criticized for their treatment of the mobilized workers. In particular, despite the promise that participants would be given parts of the lands developed under the projects, the government refused to give away the lands for free on the ground that they are state properties. The former members of the Seosan Development Corps fought a legal battle for a long time over the distribution of the developed lands. Finally, in 2013, they executed land sales contracts with the government. However, despite their ongoing demand, the government has yet to launch an official investigation.