Pergamon WorldDevelopment, Vol. 25, No. 6, pp. 883-888, 1997 0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd All rights reserved. Printed in Great Britain 0305-750x/97 $17.00+ 0.00 PII: s0305--750x(97)000094 Japanese Colonialism and Korean Development: A Reply ATUL KOHLI* Princeton University, New Jersey U.S.A. 1. INTRODUCTION Professors Stephan Haggard, David Kang and Chung-in Moon (HKM from here on) enumerate four criticisms of the “revisionist” interpretation of Korea’s development, including that of my earlier essay in this journal (Kohli, 1994). Their efforts provide a welcome opportunity to debate an important topic, as well as to clarify or qualify some issues, reiterate others, and disagree with yet others. The main contention below is that, whereas HKM provide some useful qualifications, the central point of such “revisionist” scholars as Cumings (1984) and Eckert (1991), as well as of my earlier essay in this journal stands: any full explanation of South Korea’s impressive postwar economy must take into account the state, society and the economy that country inherited from a relatively unique Japanese colonial past. In order to deal with HKM’s arguments against this position, I will discuss each of their four criticisms serially. 2. THE ECONOMIC RECORD AND LEGACIES First, HKM argue that I overestimate both economic growth in Korea under Japanese rule and the enduring legacy of this growth for postwar years. As to the growth record during the colonial period, HKM focus on agricultural growth. My earlier argument on this issue - based mainly on data generated by the well-known Korean economic historian, Sang-Chyul Suh (1978) - can be briefly reiterated: I argued that rice production in colonial Korea (say, during 1910-40) grew at a respectable rate of some 2% per annum, and that a fair amount of this growth was a result of improved yields per unit of land. Productivity growth, in turn, reflected Japanese government’s deliberate promotion of irrigation, improved seeds and the use of fertilizer. Irrespective of the unpleasant facts that these Japanese actions were selfishly motivated and that most Koreans did not benefit from such colonial growth, the experience of a steady, “modem” (i.e., productivity-led) agricultural growth was nearly unique in the history of colonialism. This experience set Korea (along with Japan and Taiwan) apart from much of Asia - not to mention other parts of the developing world - and must be taken into account as a contributing factor in that country’s subsequent economic dynamism. HKM wish to dispute this line of thinking, but the exact grounds of their disagreement are not clear. For example, let us consider the issue of agricultural output in the colonial period. According to HKM’s own Table 2, agricultural and related products in colonial Korea grew steadily during 1911-38 at an average, annual rate of 3.17%, a figure substantially higher than anything I ever claimed. It is surprising that HKM never discuss the implications of these data, especially considering that they tend to contra- dict the tone of their specific discussion. HKM nevertheless provide a few important correctives in this discussion that, taken on their own, would imply some downward adjustment to my already lower estimates, though by how much is not clear. What is further confusing, however, is that HKM use figures for agricultural production as a whole to dispute my more limited claims, based as they were on rice production data. Setting aside these confusions and using the same sources as used by HKM,’ what we know about agricultural and rice production in colonial Korea *I would like to thank Bruce Cumings, Carter Eckert and Robert Wade for their help in preparing this rejoinder. As usual, they are not responsible for any of my weaknesses. This was written while I was on sabbatical at the Russel Sage Foundation. Final revision accepted: January 25, 1997. 883