In Seoul, how a person goes about his business in a given day is now easily reconstructed. CCTVs are everywhere; payment terminals at buses, subways and convenience stores record all transactions; and black boxes in vehicles scan streets and alleys 24 hours a day. Pedestrians are ready to pull out their smartphones to take pictures or start video-recording upon unexpected encounters.

Ironically, such reconstruction becomes a serious challenge when it comes to a government decision making process for key national policies. The point is, the entire process is hardly traceable. Often times, documents detailing a deliberation process are usually not created or maintained. What is put on the record is usually just a short summary of the discussion and deliberation together with a final conclusion along with official seals or signatures. So, even a key national decision tends to leave only a several-page document. The Real Name Financial Transaction policy of 1993, a reform measure that brought a significant change to the Korean financial market, is reduced to an eight-page report. As has been pointed out by many, only scant records exist inside the government regarding the chronology for the 1997 financial crisis in Seoul.

Likewise, more often than not, important meetings tend not to produce detailed minutes. Minutes, even if called that way, contain a short summary of discussions and a final decision. Minutes hardly reveal what actually happened and who spoke what. Some meetings even do not leave a written record, prompting speculation. So, during the probe into the scandal surrounding President Park Geun-hye recently, it was the diaries and schedulers of officials, rather than official government records, that helped reconstruct what happened when and where.

Even if records and documents exist, not all of them are fully shared. Aides of the former President Kim Young-sam once mentioned that they had found empty cabinets when they entered the Blue House in February 1993. Same complaints were lodged by the aides of the former President Kim Dae-jung five years later. Similar problems were again raised during the recent transition of administrations.

What apparently prompted this “record minimalism” seems to be the (wrong) perception that a detailed record, if left, may haunt those who have participated in the decision making process. So, the belief goes, it is better to leave as little record as possible: Detailed records may provide plenty to criticize afterward, but a lack or even absence thereof rarely does.

Unfortunately, this systemic lack of records sows doubts in the minds of outsiders from countries where detailed record-creating and keeping are an important virtue and sometimes obligation. In some countries, it is not unusual that even phone conversations are recorded in documents, if they relate to important issues. To them, absence of documents only raises questions as to the purpose of a meeting and appropriateness of a decision.

Our ancestors were much better record keepers. The Joseon Dynasty was obsessive about making and leaving a detailed record of the daily activities of kings. The Annals of Joseon Dynasty (Joseon-wangjo-silok) recorded in 1,707 volumes 472 years of daily conversations, debates and events of 25 kings. Two royal history officials followed a king in his every move to record virtually everything. One wrote down conversations and the other described the king’s outer appearance and complexion. The arrival of a results-oriented, fast-growing industrialized society has suddenly washed away this good practice. And we now know much more about a conversation in the Chosun court several hundred years ago than a recent cabinet meeting.

Detailed records should be made of debates and deliberations on key national businesses, so that the next generation knows exactly what happened and learns from it. Of course, some highly confidential information may not be disclosed to the public for a certain period of time, but at least it should be kept in the national archives for the next generation. Many times, we start empty-handed and create the wheels again.

The story of memoranda prepared by a former FBI director and other US officials after important meetings and conversations, even after one-on-one meetings, spotlights the record minimalism in our government’s business. In retrospect, a lot of political controversies and national confusion would have been averted if we had a system of leaving detailed records.


By Lee Jaemin

Lee Jae-min is a professor of law at Seoul National University. He can be reached at jaemin@snu.ac.kr. -- Ed.