Abstract

The so-called ‘8‧10 Seongnam Uprising’ in 1971 was a urban riot which broke out against the incredible price of government-supplied land and inhuman living environment in the Seongnam new town. This accident has been defined as an immoral and illegitimate urban violence of the urban poor who were forcefully evacuated out of the central Seoul. However, this definition reflects the standpoint of the ruling elite who intended to undercover this accident for its image of disgrace to them. Hitherto-suggested characterization on this accident can be summarized into three key words: rampage, resistance and struggle. By reviewing the existing interpretation critically, this paper attempts to redefine the 8‧10 Seongnam Uprising as the urban weak’s first collective action to assert and protect, in Lefevre’s terms, their ‘urban rights’ even at a primordial level. By doing so, possibility is sought to come across the urban identity of Seongnam City which will be instrumental to its self-centered development in the future.