出版物 等에 의한 名譽毁損罪 硏究

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to obtain reasonable and valid conclusions through examinations of libel relating to issued publications based on criminal codes through bibliographical research. These days, new media such as newspapers, magazines, televisions and the Internet network have worked as a means to improve freedom of expression and organize the order of democracy. However, evil practices are occurring due to mass media, one of which is libel. In addition, as current society has become hugh and urbanized thanks to development of communication equipment and technology, the liber cases are getting complex and diversified, and they have caused many large damages. As democratic countries have to create and maintain democratic political orders by integrating opinions of the majority based on free formation and delivery of public opinions, the freedom of expression, in particular, on public matters should be guaranteed as an important constitutional right. However, private rights such as personal honor or personal freedom and secret should be also protected. So, how to deal with the crash of two benefits such as protection of personal honor and guaranty of expression right should be decided by comparing several social profits and measuring the values obtained through protection of profits, values and personality. The previous countermeasure against mass media usually focused on criminal punishment. It prosecuted offenders of liber or employees of mass media so that they could be punished through criminal cases, which was designed to compensate for emotional damages and prevent repetition of liber cases. However, these days, instead of punishment according to criminal procedures , monetary compensation or proper measures for recovery of honor have been used according to civil procedures. In th beginning, the libel cases were involved in criticism against policy of the government or public officers or critical proposal to incite insurrection or criticize churches, and they were generally treated as criminal cases, but these days, they tend to rely on the civil procedures. It is because the libel cases are involved in complex interests that can not be resolved only with psychological compensation when criminal punishment is given to wrongdoers and as most of the offenders are wealthy business men, the victims can have satisfactory monetary compensation. However, there are still many libel cases to be criminally prosecuted as a means of civil relief in our country. Our country has higher weight of criminal cases on libel relating to the mass media than advanced counties. It is related to the general tendency that our people tend to resolve the problems based on criminal procedures instead of civil procedures for civil conflicts. Currently, there are many publications which deal with libel cases in the perspective of constitutional or civil procedures while not many ones that deal with them in the perspective of criminal procedures. The parties concerned tend to resolve general libel cases through civil procedures, but in consideration of libel cases by publications that have significantly increased recently, libel crimes involved in criminal codes are also increasing. However, in the past, there were not many cases that sought for legal relief means against libel cases. It was not because there were less libel cases, but because recognition on intangible personality rights such as honor was lower and though their rights of honor were infringed, the victims were unwilling to reveal it, fearing that their honor was more damaged. However, as cases focusing on serious libel have increased recently, the means to relive have more diversified. As more victims are raising suits, the quantity and quality of judgement are increasing, and more monetary compensation are required in civil suits. This study speculated basic concepts of libel cases involved in publications, and identified what meaning values of basic rights such as protection of honor, freedom of mass media and publication have in discussing libel crimes involved in publications based on the criminal codes. And it conducted comparative analysis on foreign legal theories in respect to legal theories of libel crimes through publications. In particular, it examined the tendencies of Germany and America in respect to special treatment of public figures such as politicians or movie stars to present improvement plans of Korean criminal codes. It also examined several issues involved in the theme based on existing bibliography on libel crimes in publications in the perspective of criminal codes in order to present several reasonable and valid conclusions on libel crimes involved in publications. It was somewhat afraid that we deal with the theme of libel crimes involved in publications and mass media only in the perspective of the Constitution, but this study tried to deal with it within the boundary of criminal perspective.