The End of Korea’s Hojuje System: How Women’s Rights Activists Changed Gender Politics and Family Law

For decades in South Korea, the hojuje (family headship) system defined South Korean citizenship through a patriarchal lineage, legally subordinating women under male heads of household. Despite South Korea’s rapid democratization in the late 20th century, this system persisted as a protected symbol of “traditional” Confucian values. This paper utilizes a feminist institutionalist framework and historical process tracing to analyze the successful abolition of hojuje , culminating in the Constitutional Court’s 2005 ruling and the subsequent Civil Act revisions effective in 2008. The study examines how women’s rights activists strategically reframed family law reform not merely as a gender equality issue, but as a project of post-colonial restoration, arguing that hojuje was a vestige of Japanese imperial rule rather than authentic Korean tradition. Furthermore, the research highlights the strategic shift from legislative lobbying to constitutional litigation, demonstrating how judicial review served as a critical mechanism to break conservative political inertia. Ultimately, this case illustrates how transitional democracies leverage the alignment of domestic family law with global human rights standards as a crucial soft power strategy.