Rok and Uk: a Comparison

Each modern nation in the world has something that makes it unique when compared to the others, but in the same way, many similarities can be drawn between two countries when they are placed side by side. In this paper, the two modern countries of the Republic of Korea and the United Kingdom will be compared. Both these nations have a rich and distinct history, and when looked at together, one can see how, while they do share similarities, their histories are practically inverted, though what is commonly known about their histories began at a similar point in time. This makes them easier to compare than, say, Korea and the United States, which is a relatively young nation at less than three hundred years old compared to Korea’s two thousand or so. In the case of Korea, in its earliest known history it was a small but distinct country with a past of fighting off outside invaders—though its kingdoms were also contenders in terms of influence with its neighbors. It went through a period of colonization, war, and military rule, and at one time was one of the poorest nations on earth. Today it has overcome its previous troubles and is, for all intents and purposes, a very strong nation on its own, able to extend its bounties to lesser nations today. Similarly, the United Kingdom began as a small, island nation prone to foreign invasion and made up of several smaller, distinct kingdoms of its own. In contrast to Korea, however, its natural resources allowed it to spearhead the Industrial Revolution in the West, and it became a major world power that created an Empire of its own, and over time its influence subsided. Today it is a small but influential constitutional monarchy that remains important on the world stage, and has left its legacy on the world for sure, but is hardly as worthy of fear as it was on its own.
The Republic of Korea as it is known today was not considered particularly formidable until very recently, neither by its Asian neighbors nor by the West....