To Love or Let Go] Workers of the K-pop world, unite

Members of SAG-AFTRA decide to go on strike after a vote at the union’s headquarters in Los Angeles, California, in 2023. (AFP/Yonhap)

Could there be a union for K-pop idols? No, let me rephrase the question. What would a K-pop scene with a labor union look like? This will require a little imagination. That’s because we need to ask questions that we’ve unconsciously assumed to be completely ridiculous.

For instance, why does the exclusive contract that idols first sign with companies lock them in for seven years? (Of course, this is a clear standard that was won through a legal battle, and marked a vast improvement from conditions before, but it’s been a while since the change.) Is seven years enough time for an agency to get a return on the investments they’ve poured into fostering a star? How about reducing the burden of repayment on idols, in whom agencies start investing heavily when they’re still trainees and minors? 

In an industry where the wisdom is “the younger, the better,” idols are encouraged to debut as early as possible. Having an eye for promising prospects and initiating their training as early as possible is part of an agency’s competitiveness. Does that make it impossible to free idols of the burden to repay their agencies? In that case, is it proper to maintain the conventional wisdom of needing to “debut before 20” and youth equaling competitiveness? 

Once the questions come this far, we are forced to ask why there hasn’t been a deeper discussion about idols being nothing more than carefully designed commodities at a time when the K-pop training system has become an exportable product that we should be “proud” of. One cannot help but think that if the industry had a labor union, things could have looked different today. 

The bunny mascot for NewJeans is fitted with a typical labor union vest and headband against a background that features the lyrics of “March for the Beloved,” a protest song about the Gwangju Democratization Movement of 1980 in a meme that made the rounds on social media.

You could say something like this. When the 2023 negotiations between the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers broke down, the WGA went on a massive strike. One of the WGA’s demands was related to generative AI. At the end of their 148-day strike, the WGA secured a meaningful agreement. If a studio produces a scene in which actors do not directly perform, the studio must inform the actors 48 hours beforehand and obtain clear consent from the actors. The agreement also obliges studios to hire extras for scenes that exclude the main performers. (The agreement was meant to prevent studios from using generative AI to avoid hiring extras.)

Music is just as vulnerable to generative AI as films are. By tapping my phone’s touchscreen, I can access idols who have a sound that is so good it makes me marvel, but I don’t want to see their music be reproduced as “AI covers” on YouTube.  

What becomes of the singer who has worked for years to develop a unique sound? Shouldn’t we have discussions about preventing companies from using idols’ voices as fodder for machine learning, about a regulatory baseline that entertainment firms should follow when producing content? 

We can ask another provocative question at this point. Suppose we question the industry’s current ranking system for idols? For instance, should we continue using album sales (first iteration) as a ranking index? Producing mass quantities of physical albums not only results in tons of unnecessary waste, but it subjects idols to service labor that requires them to attend album signings for months on end. How about discussing ways to set up a basic safety net regarding such labor?  

(There was an incident in 2017 where a male fan used special glasses that allowed him to illegally film a girl group during an album signing.)

We could have a discussion about whether ranking indices offer a fair system for providing opportunities to a variety of idols. Today’s K-pop industry has been restructured by major agencies absorbing several smaller labels. Fanbases are mostly proportional in size to the agencies that manage groups, and current ranking systems determine the scale and purchasing power of such fanbases. In other words, idols from smaller agencies are less likely to be discovered on official rankings and gain further opportunities. 

Amid this reality, performers appear on audition programs in the hopes of garnering attention. These days, idols go on audition programs even after they’ve secured contracts with agencies and after their official debuts. In the endless cycles of competition and elimination perpetuated through audition shows, are the health and labor rights of idols guaranteed? It is worth doubting the legitimacy of this infinite cycle. That is, if there are others willing to express their doubts. 

Even without taking the discussion into these larger questions, we can imagine that with a union, performers might at least have a bit better bargaining capabilities than they do now when it comes to coordinating their various activities and performance schedules.

Indeed, attorney Jang Seo-yeon of the GongGam Human Rights Law Foundation recently commented on the lack of safeguards for performers’ rights under K-pop’s current exclusive contract system.

In particular, she pointed out that even though “the responsibilities and time demands associated with the services that performers are obliged to offer are growing proportionally with the trend of increasing scale of investment,” the management agencies’ responsibilities remain poorly defined.

“The right thing to do in terms of legal equity would be to assign management agencies the obligation and legal responsibility to maintain relationships with high levels of trust, and to recognize the performers’ right to terminate [their exclusive contracts] if those are violated,” she suggested.

The Hanbit Center for Media Workers’ Rights holds a press conference at the Seoul office of the National Union of Media Workers on April 29, 2025, to about a former K-pop idol suing the CEO of 143 Entertainment for sexual assault. (courtesy of the Hanbit Center)

Even as the popular music industry has passed from its first generation all the way to its fifth — and as K-pop has established itself as a genre and industry representative of Korea’s national stature — some things have doggedly refused to change. This is not a matter of management company scale, either.

An “idol evaluation” report by Hybe, Korea’s largest management company, was made public at a parliamentary audit last year. In April, the CEO of 143 Entertainment was accused of indecent acts for allegedly verbally abusing and sexually assaulting a girl group member while she was a minor. These examples show the vulnerable state that performers have been left in when it comes to labor rights and personality rights.

I am aware that the idea of an “idol union” may sound like a romantic notion. When I raised the question of how difficult it would actually be for K-pop performers to form a union, people working in the music, broadcasting, and entertainment industries all dismissed it as unrealistic.

Their position was that the situations the different performers faced were vastly different. Some are obligated to work so much that they have no time to look after their own physical and mental health; others are forced to take breaks during periods of inactivity. The insiders suggested it was difficult to imagine all of them coming together based on common interests.

We also have to think of the core spirit associated with the “K” in “K-pop.” Performers need to work hard and sacrifice in silence, approaching things with the kind of dedication and fierceness that allows them to overcome the more irrational aspects. Most of all, there is a sense of familism at work — the idea that they ought to be grateful for their agency’s investment and not betray them at a human level. In such an environment, a union is inconceivable.

I’m also aware of a reality where performers need to receive confirmation from their agency for every statement and action that gets aired to the outside, and how difficult it is for the performers I support to speak out on their own when they live under the unwritten code of fan service, where people go out of their way not to voice opinions on social issues.

Still, I dream of a day when the performers speak out for themselves more. That’s because a reality where they do not do so is one where they end up inevitably shut out of any kind of institutional discussions that relate to labor rights. This was illustrated during the 21st National Assembly, when a debate over amending the terms of the Popular Culture and Arts Industry Development Act in connection with the working hours of underage popular culture and art professionals ended up foundering.

That amendment would have reduced the maximum working hours from their current levels, while instituting specific standards for age ranges such as “under 12,” “12-14,” and “15 and up.” Its terms would have introduced a provision for penalties against management agencies that violated said limits.

But although it was passed by the presiding standing committee (the Culture, Sports and Tourism Committee), it ultimately ran aground during discussions in the Legislation and Judiciary Committee. One of the factors responsible for this fate was strong opposition from associations representing the management agencies.

While the major management agencies have grown strong enough to contact the National Assembly directly — and while the smaller ones have been following their lead — the voices of the performers who actually do the singing and dancing have gone more or less unheard. This is true even when we consider the specific and insular nature of the industry, which means the performers’ voices are the ones we need to hear the most.

Soyou, a former member of the girl group Sistar, appears in an “SBS Special” documentary on bodies that aired in 2024. “I felt disgusted when I looked at myself [after gaining weight],” she says. (still from SBS)

The reason I have not given up hope entirely has to do with the cracks that have begun to show. Hanse, a member of the group Victon, has spoken explicitly about the burden that music broadcasting appearances create for performers. The members of NewJeans opted to grab the mike and speak for themselves, knowing of the criticism and legal battles this stood to bring on them.

When Hybe’s “idol evaluation” report emerged, singer Seungkwan of the group Seventeen posted a message on his Instagram account that read, “While there are certain things that I have to put up with because I chose the profession of entertainer and I received a lot of love from people, I don’t think it’s a profession where I feel like I need to somehow put up with being wounded and eating away at myself to the brink of death.”

Singer Taeyeon posted a statement on her Instagram account from a fan association that was critical of the recent abrupt cancellation of one of her scheduled performances in Japan. In her post, she urged her management company to work together on coming up with related measures.

We have also seen cases where performers have decided the scope of their activities on their own and spoken out actively about the negative effects of the industry.

Dowoon, the drummer for the band Day6, announced in October 2024 that he was quitting the paid communication platform Bubble, explaining that he was “in a situation now where I need to tend to myself a bit.”

Others have appeared at National Assembly roundtables talking about the labor and human rights issues associated with apprenticeship based on their own experiences as performers. They include former Teen Top member Bang Min-su, former Brave Girls member Noh Hye-ran, and former Bob Girls member Heo Yu-jeong. In a documentary, performers such as Han Seung-yeon of Kara, Jeon Hyo-seong of Secret, Soyou of Sistar, and Hwasa of Mamamoo spoke frankly about the ways in which the K-pop scene’s longstanding practices related to the body had impacted them.

Let’s go back to the question I asked in a previous column. As an enthusiastic supporter of the K-pop scene, have I been able to find a “better” way of supporting performers? I feel like I can still only shake my head.

For all the thought I’ve put into seeking out the best ways of offering support, I’m not confident I’ve come up with the right answer. I may harbor doubts about whether performers really need to shoot these kinds of photo cards, but at the end of the day, I’m still a fan who sees a card showing my faves at their most appealing and desperately wants to snag one for myself.

What I can say is that I’m ready to offer even louder applause to those performers who stand up and say no rather than bow to fans’ unreasonable demands; to those who wrestle seriously with questions about the K-pop scene’s practices rather than taking them for granted; and those who overcome their fears and summon the courage to speak out.

Those voices may not bring any immediate and revolutionary changes to the K-pop scene. But this is when I think we can predict real sustainability for K-pop: when we take away the constraints holding performers back from saying anything more than “we love our fans,” when the fans themselves open their hearts and listen, and when the management agencies start imagining different directions for the industry based on that.

By Park Da-hae, staff reporter

Many Koreans grew up with K-pop. While they were gravitating first toward one favorite group and then another, K-pop was expanding into a dominant genre in the global music industry and a cultural juggernaut often mentioned in the context of Korea’s national interest.
But it’s uncertain whether it will be possible to keep viewing K-pop through such rose-tinted glasses. Music labels are obsessed with profit, and fans are sick of being milked for labor under the guise of showing their support. The genre has also had its share of incidents and scandals.
In our feature series “K-pop: To Love or Let Go,” we will tackle questions that are as uncomfortable as they are essential and discuss ways to make K-pop more sustainable.
This series is brought to you by the Hankyoreh in collaboration with Women With K-pop and Field Fire.

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]

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