Pihon yŏsŏng -New Lifestyle and New Choices for Marriage and Unmarried Life in South Korea (original) (raw)

What decision do people face when getting married in a modern Asian society? At the heart of this question lie traditional attitudes toward marriage (kyŏrhont'aedo 결혼 태도 結婚態度) which are completely different from those held by Westerners. Therefore, when we discuss issues such as number of marriages, number of single households and low birth rates, it is important that these factors are understood within their own cultural framework. In East Asia, traditional ways of thinking and basic principles and ideologies are markedly different from the West. It is clearly true in the case of South Korea, where an originally patriarchal Confucian society is now facing the problem of extremely low birth rates in conjunction with the appearance of new ways of life. One of these is the main focus of this paper, namely pihon yŏsŏng, women who remain single by choice. As one of the "four dragons", South Korea is a proud and well-developed country with a strong presence in the world economy, exporting its goods and services to countries all over the world. However, by taking a closer look at Korean society and reading about its latest problems, we find that it is facing many of the problems experienced by other similarly developed European nations, namely economic imbalances caused by a rapidly aging society, gender inequality, a widening generation gap, youth unemployment, falling rates of marriage, rising divorce rates and an extremely low birth rate. Of course, we might find parallels between these nations regardless of their geographical locations, but we can also point to unique factors which originate from the cultural background of each country.