Korean Identity Issues: Establishing Korean Nationalism within the Asian World and the West

History and political science often co-mingle in studies of nationalism. While historians are more concerned with how the past events turned countries into nation-states, political scientists look at how the growth of a nation has affected their nationalism and how this influences their country and its citizens in the contemporary world. The ongoing conflict of divided Korea and the increasing economic disparity between the North and South made books on the topic of Korean nationalism much more important. It is through this complex and unusual creation of the two Korean states that has prompted such a need to understand their history and nationalism. Political history of Korea within this scope of Korean nationalism is the main idea of the authors presented within this review essay.