[KS] KSR 2002-07: _The Origins of the ChosOn Dynasty_, by John B. Duncan

[Stephen Epstein]

_The Origins of the ChosOn Dynasty_, by John B. Duncan.  Seattle: University=
 of Washington Press. 2000. 395 pages. ISBN 0-2959-7985-2.

Reviewed by J. Michael Allen
Brigham Young University - Hawaii

[This review first appeared in _Acta Koreana_, 5.1 (2002): 97-99.  _Acta
Koreana_ is published by Academia Koreana of Keimyung University.]


	Perhaps partly because we live in an age in which dynasties do not dominate=
 the political landscape, a change in dynasty seems like it should be a=
 momentous event with wide-ranging effects. Indeed, so seductive is the=
 dynastic-change paradigm that we still tend to divide up long histories=
 into dynasty-sized chunks. Such divisions compartmentalize history into=
 what appear to be more manageable portions. One of the effects of such comp=
artmentalization is to emphasize discontinuities and apparent new starts,=
 often at the expense of comparable attention to structures, ideas, and=
 institutions that are resistant to changes in the surname of the ruling fam=
ily.

	It need not only be dynasties that have the powerful effect of attracting=
 to themselves credit for fundamental changes that either did not happen at=
 all, or happened over a much longer period of time than a simple change of=
 government can account for. I remember as a graduate student being=
 intrigued by Princeton historian (now emeritus) Arno Mayer's book _The=
 Persistence of the Old Regime: Europe to the Great War_ (New York:=
 Pantheon, 1981). Mayer argued that the origins of World War I lay in the=
 desire of Europe's old aristocrats and those aspiring to such status to=
 maintain their position. He directly challenged the view that Europe's old=
 aristocracy was a museum piece in the first two decades of the twentieth=
 century, stripped of effective influence in favor of the bourgeoisie, the=
 group assumed to have emerged by this time as the real actors in the=
 European historical drama.

	It was Mayer's work, rather than other studies of Korean history, that=
 first came to mind when I took up John Duncan's important new book. Duncan=
 argues persuasively that the fourteenth-century change from KoryO to ChosOn=
 was not the wholesale replacement of an old aristocracy by a new group with=
 new interests. Rather, he examines the KoryO-ChosOn transition in the=
 context of centuries-long developments in governing structures going back=
 at least to the beginning of the KoryO kingdom in the tenth century.  It=
 was the structures put in place in the early KoryO period that led to the=
 development of the yangban aristocracy-a group whose interests were not=
 only opposed to those of the hyangni local elite (from whose ranks many of=
 the yangban originally sprang), but were increasingly at odds with royal=
 authority as well. In this situation, the forces of reform represented by=
 the powerful and ambitious Yi SOnggye were a magnet for the yangban not=
 because the latter were revolutionaries, but because they hoped to protect=
 the privileges to which their class had become accustomed.

	Duncan argues that the institutions of KoryO rule were designed to=
 accommodate the needs of the locally based hyangni, and to recognize the=
 government's need for their cooperation in the absence of a tradition of=
 strong central rule. The coalescing of the yangban as a new, centralized,=
 bureaucratic elite changed everything, however. By the late fourteenth=
 century, according to the author, "what was needed was a radical reshaping=
 of the dynasty's institutions to reflect the reality of the central=
 yangban's emergence as the dominant social group" (202). In other words,=
 Duncan does not argue that there were no important sociopolitical changes=
 across the KoryO-ChosOn expanse. The most important ones, however, occurred=
 not at the time of, or following, the dynastic transition itself, but much=
 earlier, as the institutions of power took shape after the founding of=
 KoryO. It was only in the late fourteenth century, however, that serious=
 thought was given to reshaping the state's institutional structure to=
 reflect sociopolitical realities that had changed long before. As Duncan=
 puts it, "a major feature of the KoryO-ChosOn transition was the continued=
 domination of the central bureaucracy by the great yangban descent groups=
 of the KoryO, making it very unlikely that revamped institutions=
 represented the concerns of a new social class" (204). In other words, as=
 the title of Mayer's book suggested, the founding of ChosOn represents in=
 important ways the persistence of the old regime.

	Chapter 1 of Duncan's history, "The KoryO Political System," draws on the=
 work of S. N. Eisenstadt, among others, to describe the early KoryO=
 political system and its limitations.  KoryO's kings are shown to have been=
 severely compromised in terms of their ability to wield the power of a=
 centralizing state. The primary check on royal authority was a new=
 hereditary group of land-owning high officials who dominated politics at=
 the center. This group is described in more detail in Chapter 2, "Central=
 Bureaucratic Aristocracy." Though the new bureaucratic aristocracy had its=
 roots and its wealth in land outside the capital, over the course of the=
 KoryO period their interests and identity lay more and more in the capital,=
 and they increasingly defined themselves in terms of a history of=
 office-holding rather than by reference to their earlier status as members=
 of more localized elites. By the late KoryO period, this group's sense of=
 itself had taken on the characteristics normally used to describe the=
 yangban of the ChosOn period. "The use of the term yangban by late KoryO=
 elites to refer to themselves as a discrete social entity appears to be a=
 natural consequence of the great official descent groups' awareness that=
 the source of their prestige lay in their history as central=
 office-holders" (88-89). In Chapter 3, "The Yangban in the Change of=
 Dynasties," Duncan examines in detail the continuities in the elites of the=
 KoryO and ChosOn periods. This chapter is full of statistical analysis and=
 contains the majority of the book's twenty-six tables illustrating the=
 connections between descent and central office holding.

Chapter 4, "Institutional Crisis in the Late KoryO," discusses developments=
 in the second half of the KoryO period that are crucial for understanding=
 the author's contention about the timing and nature of the sociopolitical=
 changes preceding the fourteenth-century dynastic transition.  Just at the=
 time when royal power was severely compromised due to military and Mongol=
 domination, the yangban moved into a stronger position in the central=
 bureaucracy.  The problem for these yangban was that the KoryO political=
 system was designed to meet the needs of local elites who had become=
 accustomed to exercising influence and controlling resources in a state=
 that was not strongly centralized. As described in Chapter 5, "Reform and=
 Dynastic Change," it was largely in order to resolve these contradictions=
 that the central yangban supported early ChosOn reforms. This led to=
 important areas of royal-yangban common interest, particularly in reforms=
 designed to reduce the power of local elites. In Chapter 6, "The Ideology=
 of Reform," Duncan takes up the question of the role of "a new and vigorous=
 Confucian discourse," based on Chinese Ch'eng-Chu Learning (he shuns the=
 term "Neo-Confucianism) in the KoryO-ChosOn transition. Having already made=
 the case that there was no new group of scholar-officials that rose to=
 prominence only with the advent of the new dynasty, he now challenges the=
 view that Ch'eng-Chu Learning was the "class ideology" of any such group.=
 This is not to say that Ch'eng-Chu Learning was unimportant in the early=
 ChosOn period, or that it was used only cynically to buttress a new=
 dynasty.  Interest in a revitalized Confucianism dates to the time of the=
 Mongol Yuan dynasty and its influence on KoryO, but it always had to find=
 accommodation with a Korean "Ancient Style" intellectual tradition. Indeed,=
 the set of ideas that Duncan sees motivating and justifying political=
 reform in the first half of the ChosOn period is a hybrid of Ancient Style=
 and Ch'eng-Chu. This appears to be another case in which the obvious (a=
 dynastic transition) obscures the less obvious but perhaps more important=
 (a mixing of intellectual traditions providing an ideological basis for ref=
orm).

	In the concluding chapter Duncan steps back from the details to discuss how=
 his findings relate to broader questions in Korean Studies and points to=
 some themes of interest to those whose specialties lie outside of Korea. =
 Here and throughout the book, Duncan very usefully compares his conclusions=
 about Korean sociopolitical arrangements with what is known about China. He=
 uses an impressive array of Korean primary sources as the foundation for=
 his argument, which he augments with wide reading in relevant secondary=
 material in Korean, Chinese, Japanese, and English.

	The latest volume in the Korean Studies monograph series from the=
 University of Washington's Jackson School of International Studies, under=
 the general editorship of James B. Palais, this convincing and important=
 contribution to our understanding of Korean history should also be of great=
 value to scholars interested in comparative studies of social structures=
 and political power.



Citation:
Allen, J. Michael 2002
Review of _The Origins of the ChosOn Dynasty_ by John B. Duncan (2000)
Korean Studies Review_ 2002, no. 7
Electronic file: http://www.koreaweb.ws/ks/ksr/ksr02-07.htm