South Korean Civil Society Organizations as Confidence-Builders? The Experience with South Korean Civil Society Groupings in the Republic of Korea and
South Korean Civil Society Organizations as Confidence-Builders? The Experience with South Korean Civil Society Groupings in the Republic of Korea and

Summary/Abstract: The potential of non-governmental actors, especially civil society organizations (CSOs), to build confidence and trust in conflict-prone societies has been an often discussed topic. Nevertheless, in spite of the relatively intensive interest in this issue, actual empirical evidence for it is still missing. Therefore, the main aim of this article is to search for the empirical evidence of the confidence building activities of the North-Korean-issues-centered CSOs operating in both North and South Korea.Moreover, we aim to examine to what extent the theoretical principles of the sociology of trust are relevant to the researched CSOs. At the end of the article, we conclude that even if we accept the fact that the CSOs really ‘do a good job’ in humanitarian and development aid providing, educating of defectors or awareness raising, their confidence building role remains vague.

• Details
• Contents