i know i've mentioned several times about korea having a drinking culutre. here's a related article i read today.
Women gain status in South Korea
Court ruling against drinking linked to job reflects changing society
By NORIMITSU ONISHI, New York Times
First published: Sunday, June 10, 2007
SEOUL, South Korea -- In a time-honored practice in South Korea's corporate culture, the 38-year-old manager at an online game company took his 10-person team on after-work drinking bouts twice a week. He exhorted his subordinates to drink, including a 29-year-old graphic designer who protested that her limit was two glasses of beer.
"Either you drink or you get it from me tomorrow," the boss told her one evening.
She drank, fearing that refusing to do so would hurt her career. But eventually, unable to take the drinking, she quit and sued.
In May, in the first ruling of its kind, the Seoul High Court said that forcing a subordinate to drink alcohol was illegal, and it pronounced the manager guilty of a "violation of human dignity." The court awarded the woman $32,000 in damages for the incidents, which occurred in 2004.
The ruling was as much a testament to women's growing presence in corporate life here as a confirmation of changes already under way. As an increasing number of women have joined companies as professionals in the past half-decade, corporate South Korea has struggled to change the country's thoroughly male-centered corporate culture, starting with alcohol.
An evening out with colleagues here follows a predictable, alcohol-centered pattern: dinner, usually some grilled pork, washed down with soju, Korea's national vodka-like drink; then a second round at a beer hall; then whiskey and singing at a "norae bang," a Korean karaoke club. Exhorted by their bosses to drink, the corporate warriors bond, literally, so that the sight of dark-suited men holding hands, leaning on one another, staggering toward taxis, is part of this city's nighttime streetscape. The next morning, back at the office, they are ready to fight, with reaffirmed unity, for more markets at home and abroad.
Many professional women manage to avoid much of the drinking by adopting well-known strategies. They slip away while their male colleagues indulge in a second or third round of drinking. They pour the drinks into potted plants. They rely on male colleagues, called "knights in shining armor," to take their turns in drinking games.
Companies, too, have begun to respond. Since 2005, Posco, the steel manufacturer, has limited company outings to two hours at its mill in South Korea's southwest. Employees can raise a red card if they do not want to drink or a yellow card if they want to go home early. At Woori Bank, one of South Korea's largest, an alarm rings at 10 p.m. to encourage workers to stop drinking and go home using public transportation, which stops running before midnight.
Still, at least 90 percent of company outings -- called "hoishik," or coming together to eat -- still center on alcohol, according to the Korean Alcohol Research Foundation. The percentage of women who drink has increased as they have joined companies.
South Koreans consume less alcohol than most Europeans, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a research group.
But Cho Sung-gie, the alcohol foundation's research director, estimates that South Koreans rank first in binge drinking: The goal is to drink as much as possible, as quickly as possible, so that co-workers loosen up.
