Moralized memory and national identity in post-authoritarian East Asia: victimhood democracy and the politics of belonging in South Korea

This article examines how historical memory becomes a source of democratic legitimacy and national identity in post-authoritarian East Asia. Focusing on South Korea, it analyzes the 2025 National Archives composite-photo controversy, disaster memory, and democratization to show how suffering becomes institutionalized as moral authority. The article develops the concept of victimhood democracy – alongside mnemonic regimes and oppressive democracy – to explain how democratic belonging becomes mediated through affective recognition of historical trauma. Using Korea as the primary diagnostic case and East Asia as contextual reference, it argues that memory politics increasingly structures the symbolic boundaries of national belonging.