Health between Revolution and Military Coup : The Public Health Evaluation & Planning Program and the Making of ‘Self-sufficient’ Korean Public Health, 1960—1962
10.13081/kjmh.2025.34.605
- Author:
Jaegoo KANG
1
Author Information
1. PhD Student, Department of History, Graduate School, Kyung Hee University
- Publication Type:Article
- From:Korean Journal of Medical History
2025;34(3):605-644
- CountryRepublic of Korea
- Language:Korean
-
Abstract:
This article analyzes the formation of the development-oriented path of the South Korean healthcare system in the 1960s as a complex outcome of shifts in domestic politics and foreign aid. To this end, it focuses on the Public Health Evaluation & Planning Program (1960—1962), a program that coincided with the intersection of political upheavals—the April Revolution and the May 16 military coup—and a transition in U.S. aid policy to Korea.The April Revolution led to the collapse of the Syngman Rhee regime, which had prioritized defense and development, allowing a welfare state discourse to emerge. Popular aspirations unleashed by the revolution created cracks in the ideological landscape of the 1950s, which had been dominated by the defense-and-development-first policy. From a perspective advocating the harmonization of welfare and the economy, Korean health experts and the USOM Health and Sanitation Division strongly argued for an expanded governmental role in healthcare after the revolution. This effort materialized as the Public Health Evaluation & Planning Program, a common preliminary step for long-term health planning in the international health field at the time.The military junta, which seized power through the coup a year after the revolution, sealed the cracks created by the revolution. They adopted an explicit development-first policy and focused on economic development, grounded in the logic of subsuming welfare within the framework of economic growth. Concurrently, aiming to reduce the economic burden of aid, the U.S. government rapidly curtailed public health assistance—the material foundation of Korea’s healthcare system. Furthermore, amidst the reorganization of aid agencies, the USOM Health and Sanitation Division—which had emphasized the parallel pursuit of welfare and development—was dismantled. USOM began to promote the establishment of a development-oriented healthcare system in Korea. The Korean healthcare system rapidly achieved ‘self-sufficiency’ from the U.S. but without the intended expansion of the government’s role. This dual shock of the early 1960s—the military coup and the shift in U.S. aid policy—functioned as a critical juncture, locking the Korean healthcare system into the development-oriented path.
