Truth and Reconciliation: When Powerful Actors Apologize
South Korea has issued an official apology for what it acknowledges as a shameful legacy of its modern history. Speaking on behalf of the government, a Truth and Reconciliation Commission admitted to “sending away like luggage” tens of thousands of children, who were paid for by overseas adopters. Supporting its report is a photograph showing rows of infants and young children strapped into airplane seats.
Created by the Framework Act on Settling Past Affairs (amended 6/9/2020), the South Korean Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established by the government as an independent body to investigate and uncover the truth about human rights abuses committed in the postwar period. In March, the Commission reported that it had reached conclusions about a subset of these human rights abuses; namely, intercountry adoptions.
Reportedly, the heads of four private adoption agencies were given legal guardian power over babies, some of whom had known parents. The infants were sent abroad, without consent, creating a highly profitable industry. In one case, for example, a mother passed out during labor and delivery. When she awoke, she was told that her baby had died. Sun-young Park, chair of the commission, points to legal and policy “shortcomings” within South Korea’s destitute postwar situation, with upwards of 200,000 children sent abroad since 1953.
Several receiving countries, including Norway and Denmark, have now embarked on their own investigations into international adoptions. Though the United States has received more children from South Korea than any other country, reports indicate that it has chosen not to do so.
As is the case with most reconciliation commissions, the commission here wields investigatory and truth-telling powers. It does not, however, have the power to prosecute wrongdoings. What, then, are the benefits to comprising a body of this nature?
Those who believe in the power of apology believe that a powerful actor – be it corporate leadership or state government – is stymied by unaddressed and lingering resentment built on past conflict or misdeed. Without an understanding of the causes and consequences of internal breakdown, analysts tell us, policy makers can be doomed to repetition.
As for those harmed, vindication and apology can be powerful steps toward healing. In the case of the South Korean Truth Commission, an adoptee now living in Denmark explains, “The Commission’s decision acknowledges what we adoptees have known for so long – that the deceit, fraud … within the Korean adoption process cannot remain hidden.”
