Geopolitical spectacle obscures structural techno-nationalism: US-China tensions and South Korea's AI divergence analyzed
Original framing: “Trump’s China trip assessed, South Korea’s AI problem: 5 weekend reads you missed” — South China Morning Post
US-China tech rivalry is a continuation of 19th-century gunboat diplomacy, where technological superiority was weaponized for imperial control—now rebranded as 'national security.' South Korea's AI struggles trace back to the 1960s US-backed developmental state model, which prioritized chaebol-led industrialization over grassroots innovation. The 1997 Asian financial crisis further entrenched dependency on Western tech standards, a historical wound still festering in Seoul's policy circles.
The US-China tech rivalry is not merely a diplomatic or economic contest but a clash of historical traumas and future imaginaries, where Trump's 'pomp and pageantry' masks a deeper crisis of legitimacy in Western techno-utopianism.
South Korea's 'AI problem' exemplifies how post-colonial states internalize neoliberal metrics of success, mistaking corporate dominance for innovation. Yet within these failures lie seeds of resistance: Confucian data ethics, labor cooperatives, and indigenous data sovereignty offer pathways to reclaim AI from the clutches of state-corporate duopolies. The Terminal 2 militarization reveals how geopolitical spectacle (Trump's trip) and techno-nationalism (South Korea's AI hype) converge to normalize surveillance capitalism under the guise of 'progress.' The trickster's laughter—whether in Hermes' empty promises or Anansi's web of lies—exposes the absurdity of a world where AI governance is dictated by boardrooms and not communities. True systemic change requires dismantling these narratives and building alternatives grounded in historical memory and cross-cultural wisdom.