Reflections on the meaning of cultural globalization

Korea, where ancient East Asian civilization and modern Western civilization interact and conflicting political ideologies, economic systems, and social practices collide, presents a particularly interesting case of the phenomenology of the consequences of cultural conflict involving the problems of detraditionalization, cultural hybridization, and the discontinuous nature of globalization. How do traditional religious beliefs and practices survive in modern Korean society and how do they interact with modern values and lifestyles derived from the West,particularly the United States?

What happens to a society when a cultural tradition that has valued the Confucian virtues of frugality, temperance, service to the family and local community, and natural, segmented human relations regulated by a communal sense of propriety and order transforms into one in which individualism, hedonism, utilitarian egotism, and the unbridled pursuit of material achievements predominate? What should replace or supplement eroding traditional values? Attempting to answer these questions requires us to seriously reflect on the relation of traditional moral culture to the contemporary situation in Korea.

Dr. Chung has taught at a number of institutions,including Boston University's College of General Studies and in the Department of Sociology and the Graduate School of International Studies at Yonsei University in Seoul.

He has published widely in both Korean and English,on social and ethical problems arising from East Asia's modern transformation. Dr. Chung has incorporated into his teaching and research the religious and social ethical problems involving globalization and encounters between civilizations with particular attention to Korea, East Asian religious traditions,and Christianity.

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