This article reviewed the articles on China published in major general magazines between 1950s and 1970s such as 『Sasanggye 』, 『Shindonga 』, 『Sedae 』, and 『Junggyung Yeongoo 』. Based on the review, this article tried to track Korean’s perception on China during the Cold War. The original form of perception on China during the Cold War, which is ‘anti-communist perception on China’ was formed because of Korean War and the Cold War system led by the United States. Although there was an official name, the People’s Republic of China, “the communist China” was widely used in Korean society. This name is an example that most clearly symbolizes the ‘anti-communist perception on China’.
The ‘anti-communist perception on China’ is well presented in Sasanggye’s China related articles. ‘The communist China’ here was considered as communist country such as ‘totalitarianism, Soviet Union’s satellite nation, anti-traditional semi-civilization, one person dictatorship, and hostile expansionism’. This perception became the mainstream discourse in Korean’s perception of China during the Cold War.
However, some intellectuals kept their distance towards the ‘anticommunist perception on China’ and suggested critical viewpoint. Under the expansion of arguments between Sino-Soviet disputes and introduction of new viewpoint of China from the United States, some intellectuals insisted that ‘one needs to escape from the restriction of ideology’ in considering international relations and ‘one needs to have independent viewpoint in studying China escaping from ideological bias’. Furthermore, some suggested that we should use the name ‘China’ instead of ‘communist China’, or we should consider the establishment of ‘communist China’ as a part of modernization. This phase also appeared in the reaction towards the Chinese Cultural Revolution. That is, under the overwhelmingly negative perception on China, some suggested that the Chinese Cultural Revolution as ‘the human revolution’.
In 1970s, so-called ‘the post-Cold War interests and researches on China’ expanded more actively along with the East Asian Cold War phenomenon based on the U.S-Sino reconciliation. Along with this atmosphere, one new perception on China was suggested which is totally different from the ‘anti-communist perception on China’. It is so-called ‘idealized Chinese perception’ which was formed based on a view that considers the Chinese Cultural Revolution as ‘the human revolution’. Under the idealized Chinese perception, China is not a target for ‘guarding, hostility, or fighting’ but a revolution model for Korean society and a country that creates the third human civilization. I focused on the fact that the idealized perception on China is perception from practical intellectuals which criticized not only the Cold War and the ideology of anti-communism but also economy development priority pursued by authoritative government. A powerful plan to seek for post-Cold War relationship between East Asian countries, especially Korea-China relationship, is to review each country’s Cold War experience (or Cold War culture) critically and analyze each country’s critical causes for Cold War and generated perception’s structures and characteristics. It would be meaningful to share this information each other.