일제강점기 제주 산지항 축항 연구

Abstract

The Sanji Port on the northern coast of Jeju Island was formed into its current shape after undergoing three phases of construction during the Japanese colonial period. In this study, I attempt to grasp the intentions of the agents who established the Sanji Port and what they hoped to achieve, by examining discussions surrounding the port construction and the actual construction process. The policies that influenced the construction and other historical backdrops are also reviewed in this study, with highlights on the factual analysis of the circumstances and the process of the port construction. The first phase of the Sanji Port establishment was led by the Port Construction Promotion Alliance, whose members included influential local Jeju figures. In the 1920s, the opening of the sea routes between Jeju and the Korean mainland and between Jeju and Osaka resulted in a surge of the number of locals traveling or migrating to and from different regions outside of the island. Shipping and forwarding agents, who had been working based on the current Sanji Port area, organized the Port Construction Promotion Alliance and requested the Japanese Government-General of Korea to construct the Sanji Port. After 1923 when Maeda Zenji was inaugurated as the Governor of Jeju Island, the port construction plan was revised to equip the planned port with a large-scale breakwater. As the revision of the plan increased the estimated cost of construction, the first phase of the Sanji Port establishment resulted in the separation of the breakwater construction and the foreshore reclamation. The separate construction projects deferred the completion of the port facilities, and the resulting demand for financing, as well as the borrowing for the construction costs, brought changes to the administrative system of Jeju-myeon. The second phase of the Sanji Port establishment was in line with the first phase but lacked continuity. The reason lay in the fact that the overall construction project in the first phase was delayed and that Japan later restricted civil engineering projects due to the Great Depression. The second phase of the Sanji Port establishment was promoted as a part of the nationwide Poverty Relief Civil Engineering Project in 1931. Ostensibly, the Poverty Relief Civil Engineering Project was a relief measure for the unemployed, but in effect, it was a measure to secure social overhead capital facilities for colonial exploitation. Due to this, the Japanese Government-General of Korea supervised the construction more strictly than in the first phase although the rate of the national government subsidies for the construction cost remained the same in the second phase. Unlike the first and second phases, the third phase of the Sanji Port establishment was not intended to secure facilities for the transportation of general vessels and their passengers. Instead, the port facilities were expanded and remodeled so that special-purpose cargo, which contained materials for war, could be transported conveniently. The Japanese Government-General of Korea established the Jeju Island Development Plan in 1937, and in 1938, it planned to create an alternative fuel manufacturing plant which would use Jeju-grown sweet potatoes, in step with the Fuel Localization Policy of 1938. Accordingly, the Oriental Development Company agreed to build the Absolute Alcohol Manufacturing Plant in Jeju with the precondition of expanding the Sanji Port and constructing the site for the plant. In the third phase, the Sanji Port construction failed to be completed due to emergency circumstances, and fell under military control during the Pacific War. As the construction progressed from the first to the third phases, the intentions and policies of the Japanese Empire influenced the port establishment more greatly than those of the Jeju residents who were the actual users of the port. The social and economic factors at the time, as well as the turbulent changes with the passing of the times, also affected the port construction. Therefore, it is deemed that reviewing the actual phases of the establishment of the Sanji Port constitutes a good case study for understanding the social conditions and their changes at the time, as well as the intentions of the colonial authorities.