1960년 마산의거에 대한 ‘특수성’과 ‘보편성’ 논쟁

Abstract

The April Revolution aroused against the March 15th fraudulent presidential election of 1960 refers collectively to the nationwide resistance of Feb. 29th Daegu Students' Movement, the first and second Masan Movement of March 15th and April 11th, and the Seoul Students' Movement of April 18th and 19th, etc. However, the term April Revolution can be considered as being quite Seoul centered. For example, it was the Masan Movement of March 15th and April 11th which had a decisive role in triggering the April Revolution. However, there is a strong tendency to describe the Masan Movement by just limiting it as a regional event or a preliminary event leading to the April Revolution. The attitude to perceive the Masan Movement as just a regional event is clearly revealed in the attitude of how the Syng-man Rhee government tried to treat it as a light event occurring somewhere in the rural area or as a particular event of a particular region which had become implicated with the Communists and the Democratic Party. However, the event which took place in 1960 in the provincial Masan, condensing all the contradiction of the Republic of Korea’s politics of the time and expressing the pent-up discontent against the Syng-man Rhee government, was one that was universal and general in its characteristics. The Syng-man Rhee government and the ruling Liberal Party justified their violence, actively using anti-communist ideology and claiming that the Masan Movement was an event instigated by the Communist Party that must not ever have taken place and be suppressed for the good of the Republic of Korea. As Ju-yeol Kim died during the process and the Masan Movement spread throughout the nation, the National Assembly organized and sent the Masan Movement Investigation Commission to Mason to find out the real state of things. In the process of investigation and report, the Liberal Party defined the Masan Movement as a particular event, a disturbance, the intervention from a betraying internal group, and a riot, and justified their armed crackdown. In contrast, the Democratic Party defined the Masan Movement as an aspect of nationwide movements against fraudulent election and a democratic resistance to the ruling party’s violent suppression. As such, in the debate about the peculiar or the universal characteristic of the Masan Movement, the ruling party united with the anti-Communist ideology, suppressing and distorting the Movement to highlight its particularity, especially in the early period. However, as the resistance movement spread nationwide and the corrupt and crippled political and economical operation of the Syng-man Rhee’s government was revealed, the anti-Communist ideology also showed its limits as a suppression mechanism. As can be seen, although the Masan Movement occurred in the provincial area, it was an event of generalness which showed the contradictory aspect of the 1950 Syng-man Rhee’s government to the full.