근대 익산의 농업환경과 농민운동

Abstract

The majority of the existing studies have assessed the peasant movements under Japanese imperialism to be revolutionary peasant struggles. However, it is not easy to properly understand the development of the peasant movements that soared rapidly in the 1930s if they are viewed as a progression towards the national liberation struggle. This study, regarding the peasant movements that rapidly increased in number, focused on the fact that Iksan deployed their movement by resisting the contradiction in the commodity economy between the landlords and the farmers surrounding the development of productivity, unlike other regions in which revolutionary farmers association movements were very active. This thesis is aimed at disclosing the aspects and significance of the development of peasant movements with focus on the cases in Iksan-gun. First, the agricultural environment of Iksan is examined and the foundation on which the peasant movements were generated is assessed in order to review the aspects of the development of peasant movements in order to clarify the historical significances of peasant movements. Iksan was a region with advanced technology in the commercialization of rice and vegetables in particular, and the technological development was pursued with the Japanese landlords taking the initiatives. Moreover, the landlord-tenant farmer relationship was substantially more developed in Iksan than other regions with a high concentration of large landlords, particularly, Japanese landlords. Peasant movements in Iksan failed to develop into continuous and hierarchically organized movements despite the rapid rise in peasant movements. Moreover, the formats of the movements were largely confined to the mode of legal struggles and were resolved harmoniously through direct intervention by the colonial powers. Accordingly, the development of such peasant movements manifested due to the recognition of the forward-looking destitution by the farmers arising from ownership of land as landlords and advancement of the commodity economy. The tenant farmers of Iksan deployed their peasant movement by subjectively recognizing that the increase in the productivity leads to the increase in the production cost and expansion of the rental cost of the farm induce their economic difficulties, rather than accepting the burden of the rental cost of the farm as an obvious obligation.