For me, the jury is still out on the effectiveness of special government ministries tasked with correcting discrimination of some sort. As I’m sure readers are aware, the mere existence of a ministry implies nothing, and much more indicative of an adminstration’s political will are the resources and powers awarded to it, especially vis a vis other ministries. As I demonstrated in this post for instance, Korean parents are reluctant to send their children to kindergartens because of the frequent horror stories about the almost literal trash that children are served to eat there, but still the Ministry of Health and Welfare is not a career-advancing agency, lacks resources, and is so understaffed that officials cannot even visit kindergartens once a year to check standards.

Hence, while a hypothetical expansion of the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family may not be an automatic good (a subject that is still in the air and which I’ll cover in the next post), in a country where legislation is often completely ignored I’m inclined to think that an expansion or downsizing/elimination/merging of a ministry is much more indicative of a incoming administration’s importance attached to the issues under its “sphere of influence” than anything else.

Also, the premise that health and family are women’s issues is patronizing. Just stop before things get worse!