ABSTRACT
Belief in ethnic homogeneity is one of the key features that characterize South Korea. The sudden increase in the reference to multiculturalism, or multicultural explosion in Korea, is puzzling given the strong ethnic nationalism in Korea. This chapter addresses this puzzle by revisiting the relationship between nationalism and developmentalism. The pursuit of a new set of developmental practices in the multicultural era leads to yet another articulation of Korean national identity. The multicultural explosion in Korea demonstrates that even ethnic or cultural diversity may be promoted in the course of pursuing new sets of developmental practices. The chapter compares and contrasts the Korean government damunhwa discourse with two other preceding state discourses in modern/contemporary Korea: modernization of the fatherland under the Park Chung Hee regime, and globalization/internationalization under the Kim Young Sam and Kim Dae Jung administrations. All three discourses presented characterize the status of the Korean nation as in crisis and try to invoke a "crisis mentality" among Koreans.
