INSIGHT Edited by Matthew Lamers (mattlamers@groovekorea.com)
How the industry works The international marriage broker industry has a short but controversial history in Korea. Government recognition stretches back only two decades while regulations overseeing the legality of the practice were introduced less than 10 years ago. This isn’t surprising when looking at how fast the rate of international marriages has grown over the past 13 years. In 2000, marriage between a Korean national and a foreign spouse accounted for 3.5 percent of all marriages in the country. In five years, the figure increased almost fourfold to 13.5 percent, and currently stands at 8.7 percent. The industry itself has garnered a host of media attention. Stories of inadequate information being provided to potential spouses, women suffering domestic abuse at the hands of their new Korean husbands, a lack of sufficient regulation and support for migrant women in Korea and men being deceived by their new spouse after they receive their visa are all well-documented cases. Despite these accounts raising red flags against international marriage brokers, their popularity remains substantial. There are currently more than 1,000 brokers registered in Korea. As the popularity of international marriage agencies has increased, the government has worked with them to address various issues. Efforts by NGOs in raising awareness of the dangers associated with these brokers have not gone unnoticed. But with all of this controversial media attention, why do people still use international marriage brokers? International marriage started out as a female phenomenon with Korean women marrying foreign husbands following the Korean War. In the late ‘70s, the Unification Church — a religious movement promoting unity, founded
Korea’s migrant wives, by nationality (Number of foreign women married to Korean men) Source: Statistics Korea, Ministry of Public Administration and Security
U.S.A. 235 Thailand 270 Mongolia 77
Others 552
in Korea after the Second World War — encouraged international marriage in a bid to help foster harmony between Korea and Japan. In the church’s early years, the movement’s then-leader Sun Myung Moon matched more than 2,000 Korean nationals with Japanese spouses in a single marriage ceremony. Such mass marriage ceremonies still occur today. The phenomenon became male-dominated when China and Korea established international relations in 1992. With farm bachelors in rural parts of the Korean countryside unable to find wives, local government offices began matching them with ethnic Korean women in China referred to as Joseonjok. These local offices, unable to link the couples together, established a middleman to act as a matchmaker. With the realization that profits could be made from linking Korean men with a foreign bride, an industry of international marriage brokers began to surface. Along with this, the range of available wives expanded to other Southeast Asian countries. In 2000, out of the 7,304 international marriages that took place between Korean men and a foreign spouse, the largest number of brides by nationality came from China (3,586) and the Philippines (1,358). In 2009, Chinese brides still made up the majority (34 percent) followed by women from Vietnam (22 percent). As the industry grows, the demographic of men who seek their services has changed. In the beginning, men who solicited international marriage brokers lived in rural areas where there was a shortage of women, who tended to gravitate toward cities for work. Local governments promoted the use of marriage brokers as a way of repopulating the area. More recently, as Korea’s male birthrate outpaces the female, the scope of men seeking migrant wives has widened to the general male population.
Russia 1,331 Thailand 2,741 Mongolia 2,798 Cambodia 4,404
Others 7,157
Japan 9,877 Philippines 11,874
Philippines 1,358
China 53,159
China 3,586 Vietnam 41,603
Japan 1,131
Vietnam 95
30 www.groovekorea.com / November 2013
2000
2011
(Total: 7,304)
(Total: 134,944)