Friendship Cities: Gwangju and Leipzig – Bound by Democracy
By David J. Richter
Gwangju has numerous partnerships with different cities all over the world. In this article we will take a look at one of these, the partnership with friendship city Leipzig. Leipzig is a city located in the east of Germany, in the former DDR (East Germany) in the state of Saxony. It is home to about 600,000 people and is the largest city in Saxony as well as the eighth largest city in all of Germany. As an old
and storied university and trade fair city, Leipzig hosts numerous cultural sites.
The Leipzig–Gwangju partnership was established in 2007, after which things were made official in 2011 when both cities signed a memorandum of understanding, as did Leipzig University and Chonnam National University Hospital. Both cities share a past of democratic movements in their respective countries. Gwangju had the Gwangju Uprising of 1980, while Leipzig had the Peaceful Revolution in 1989. Leipzig’s revolution, which was part of nationwide protests at the time, led to the eventual fall of the DDR (East Germany) and made way for Germany’s reunification.
Since the establishment of the friendship and cooperation partnership, both cities have engaged in a variety of exchanges, with a lot of progress being made in recent years. In 2023, a delegation of Leipzig city officials came to Gwangju, with a Korean delegation heading to Germany only shortly after, to strengthen the cities’ ties. In the same year, Leipzig city officials traveled east to sign a cooperation agreement between the two cities’ offices of education. In 2024, a number of artist exchanges took place, where artists from both cities got the chance to exhibit their work in their partner city.
The year 2025 brought with it a number of student exchange programs enabled by the agreement signed two years earlier. A Global Science Exchange Program between two high schools took place where Gwangju students first traveled to Germany, after which the Leipzig students came to Gwangju soon afterwards in return. Gwangju Science High School sent 16 first-year students to Leipzig, where they engaged in cultural and local activities. All the students stayed with local German partner families to further immerse themselves in the foreign culture. The Korean students presented research results to their German counterparts, followed by a Q&A session. When the German students made their way to Gwangju, they too did homestays, visited the May 18 memorial site, and presented research results.
Exchanges such as these are expected to continue in the future to further strengthen cooperation and global understanding between the cities of Gwangju and Leipzig, Germany.
The Author
David Jona Richter, born and raised in the extreme south of Germany, is a current graduate student at Chonnam National University. Before coming to Korea in 2022, he spent three years in the U.S. Midwest city of Chicago.
Cover Photo: Gwangju Global Exchange Students in Leipzig in January. (Wilhelm-Ostwald-Gymnasium Leipzig)