The Whitlam government and the Republic of Korea: responding to human rights challenges in foreign policy

Despite the Whitlam government’s (1972–1975) vocal commitment to human rights and the fact that the Republic of Korea (ROK or South Korea) experienced serious human rights issues throughout the Whitlam government’s tenure in office, little research has examined how it responded to these human rights challenges. This article uses understudied Australian documents to shed further light on the government’s human rights diplomacy towards South Korea. It demonstrates that the Whitlam government protested Kim Dae Jung’s kidnapping and sought a swift resolution to his case, it expressed scepticism about the utility of the emergency measures announced in 1974 and made representations about the subsequent crackdown, and Don Willesee, the Australian minister for foreign affairs from 1973–1975, also raised the ROK government’s oppressive policies with his opposite number during his trip to South Korea in June 1975. The Whitlam government was variously motivated to raise human rights matters due to the pursuit of strategic interests, the force of public pressure, and the perception that support for the ROK was getting more difficult to justify given its oppressive domestic policies. The Whitlam government’s vocal commitment to human rights was borne out in the practice of its foreign policy towards the ROK.