INTRODUCTION

As is frequently reported in the media, South Korean non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are active in advocacy activities; they make policy proposals and critique and monitor government activities on political issues. They exert such a large influence in the country that they are sometimes called the fifth power in South Korea. For the general elections in April 2000, more than 500 NGOs got together in a Citizens' Alliance. This alliance led an effective nationwide movement for a fair and just election, and successfully ousted 70 per cent of the candidates it placed on its blacklist. However, it is only in the past ten years or so that NGOs have made their presence felt. Why have they grown so rapidly?

The quantitative expansion can be explained by the democratization and resurrection of civil society. As a divided country on the forefront of the Cold War, South Korea for many decades was characterized by strong state control over society. Particularly after Park Chung-hee seized power through a coup d'état in 1961, the state controlled resources and their distribution in all spheres, including politics, economics, and social welfare, and autonomous activities by non-governmental groups, as well as the sphere in which they could conduct activities, were strictly regulated. However, this system of control began to change following the Declaration for Democratization issued by the authoritarian “soft-liners” in 1987. Numerous NGOs sprang up as state control waned. This is how the proliferation of NGOs is often explained.

But it is not just the numerical growth that attracts our attention. Why are South Korean NGOs engaged mainly in advocacy activities? How can we account for NGOs' role in society and their influence regarded as the fifth power? To put it in another way, what activities did they play and what functions did they carry out in the process of democratization, that is, the democratic transition from authoritarian rule and democratic consolidation, of South Korea?