The Capitalist Unconscious

A stunningly original and significant contribution to a field that seems mired in a Cold War long passed. Not only does Hyun Ok Park seek to untie the knotted problem of the two Koreas, but she also persuasively provides an exemplary guide to how best unveil the interacting entanglements of history and the contemporary moment. -- Harry Harootunian, Columbia University One of the most provocative works on North Korea to emerge in years, Hyun Ok Park's The Capitalist Unconscious offers a fresh look at the past twenty years of political and socioeconomic changes in Northeast Asia. Her focus is on labor moving across borders-how it moves, generates wealth, and transforms every place it travels. The two Koreas, we learn, might not be so divided after all. -- Andre Schmid, University of Toronto Combining broad theoretical insights into Korea's rapidly changing political economy with vivid ethnographic details of migrant workers' experiences, Hyun Ok Park's The Capitalist Unconscious challenges us to reimagine the region's present, as well as its future. It will provoke lively debates about the construction of 'transnational Korea' in the twenty-first century. -- Gay Seidman, University of Wisconsin-Madison Provocative and engaging. Korean Quarterly A deeply moving, warm personal tale. Korea.net A much-needed examination of North Korea and its relationship to South Korea, China, and global capitalism writ large. -- Patrick Chung Journal of American-East Asian Relations Park's book fundamentally challenges existing understandings of Korean unification and will surely redefine debates about the meaning of a transnational Korea. American Journal of Sociology

Hyun Ok Park teaches sociology at York University. She writes about global capitalism, transnational migration, empire, postcolonialism, and the issues of comparison and comparability. She is the author of Two Dreams in One Bed: Empire, Social Life, and the Origins of the North Korean Revolution in Manchuria.

Preface Acknowledgments Part I: Crisis 1. The Capitalist Unconscious: The Korea Question 2. The Aesthetics of Democratic Politics: Labor, Violence, and Repetition Part II: Reparation 3. Reparation: On Colonial Returnee 4. Socialist Reparation: On Living Labor 5. Chinese Revolution in Repetition: The Minority Question Part III: Peace and Human Rights 6. Korean Unification as Capitalist Hegemony 7. North Korean Revolution in Repetition: Crisis and Value 8. Spectacle of T'albuk: Freedom and Free Labor Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index