ABSTRACT
This chapter shows how social groups affected by neoliberal reforms reacted to the change, and investigate the dynamics of popular contention in the context of double transition. It demonstrates how neoliberal changes galvanized protest and became a source of political strain and instability in post-authoritarian South Korea, thereby generating a force that offset a tendency toward moderation and institutionalization of popular contention. On February 25, 1997, President Kim Young Sam, overwrought by a separate corruption scandal, stood in front of a national audience on television and bowed down to South Koreans to deliver his official apologies for the troubles his party had caused. The history of popular contention in South Korea had long centered on the question of political democracy. Institutionalization was a direct correlate of South Korea's political democratization, as democratic change expanded the access points that allowed citizens to participate in the political process.
