By Korean historians, the 19<SUP>th </SUP>century has generally been perceived as an era of failures, and an era which was not successful in achieving modernization due to political parties’ abusing of their power (under the name of ‘Sedo’) as well as the government’s inability to regulate taxation properly and prevent all the ‘Three Taxations’ from spiraling out of hand. This kind of image of the era was born out of a perspective that tended to view reigns of Yeongjo and Jeongjo of the 18<SUP>th</SUP> century separately from the reigns of Sunjo to Gojong of the 19<SUP>th</SUP>. A new point of view is required if we are to examine certain continuities that existed between the 18th and 19th centuries.
Man’gi Yoram, published in King Sunjo’s reign can help us do just that, as it was compiled in 1808 (8<SUP>th</SUP> year of King Sunjo’s reign). Considering the time and efforts that would have been spent in preparation for this book, the publication date itself symbolizes the book’s very nature as being both the child of the late 18<SUP>th</SUP> and early 19th century. And the book indeed includes many policies and institutions from the era of Yeongjo and Jeongjo as well.
In essence, Man’gi Yoram was a dynastic governance manual published to assist King Sunjo who was just beginning to govern the country himself, following the end of a period during which Queen Jeongsun supervised dynastic governance in Sunjo’s stead. Shim Sang-gyu and Seo Yeong-bo led the compilation process, and while utilizing economic and military manuals earlier published during Jeongjo’s reign, many policies initiated after Sunjo’s enthronement were also inserted in this book. The choice was to put an emphasis upon Sunjo’s apparent resolve to inherit policies and institutions of previous kings, establish a firm leading authority in the process, and cement his own appearance as ‘leader[主宰者] with a divine mission.’ Man’gi Yoram also documented all the laws’ and institutions’ very nature, history and related data in order, probably as a gesture of declaring that the authors –and of course the king too in extension- honored and respected things devised and conceived in the past(18<SUP>th</SUP>) century. This kind of trend continued into the middle and later periods of the 19<SUP>th</SUP> century, during which similar dynastic governance manuals continued to be published.