CHAPTER TWELVE

SOUTH KOREA, THE SIX PARTY TALKS,

AND RELATIONS WITH THE MAJOR POWERS

KENDRA SUNDAL

1

Introduction

For South Korea, the Six Party Talks have provided a platform to engage
with the North alongside its major power allies. Yet South Korea has
occasionally also engaged with the North bilaterally throughout history in
order to work towards mending relations through all available means. In
both cases–bilaterally and multilaterally–the South’s eventual goal has
often been presumed to be sustainable peace and even the eventual future
reunification of the two Koreas. Still, the South has not pursued these
goals in a consistent manner, as changes in government have resulted in
changes in rhetoric, policy, and action.
In the following four sections, the evolution of South Korea’s position
towards the North as well as its relations with the US and China–the two
most influential outside powers in the Six Party Talks–are explored. The
first section deals with the development of South Korea’s democratic
political system since the end of World War II, and particularly following
the Korean War. The next three sections go into greater detail about the
most recent presidencies in South Korea: Kim Dae Jung, Roh Moo Hyun,
and Lee Myung Bak. In each section, various international relations
theories are considered to better understand the positions and actions of
each president in their policies towards North Korea. In addition, these
theories are also applied to the US and China in their relations with the
Korean peninsula. The next section discusses the most recent
developments on the peninsula as well as upcoming events which could

(^1) Mgr. Kendra Sundal holds a Master’s degree in Geopolitical Studies from the
Faculty of Social Sciences at Charles University in Prague.