Invisible Influencers? Faith-Based Organisations as Norm Entrepreneurs in Korea’s Development Cooperation

Korean faith-based organisations (FBOs) have long been involved in aid provision, yet their relationship to South Korea’s donor identity and development cooperation norms remains underexplored. This article examines how Korean FBOs engaged in humanitarian assistance to North Korea function as invisible norm entrepreneurs within Korea’s aid system. Drawing on a constructivist and norm diffusion framework, and based on semi-structured interviews with leaders of major FBOs, government officials, and NGO platform representatives, as well as analysis of policy documents and FBO reports, the study shows that FBOs shape key humanitarian norms such as needs-based assistance, transparency, and localization through their agenda-setting, funding practices, and coalition-building. Despite their limited formal visibility in core ODA laws and strategies, Korean FBOs operate as knowledge providers, catalysts for humanitarian initiatives, and quiet standard-setters in the politically sensitive field of aid to North Korea. The article argues that understanding Korea’s evolving donor identity and aid practices requires recognising the normative agency of FBOs and their ambivalent position between state policy, religious communities, and global humanitarian regimes.