This article has focused on the activity agenda of Daegu YWCA and Daegu YMCA, experiences of activists, and the CSOs image of college students in Daegu and Gyeongbuk region to investigate the persistence and prospect of CSO activities in Daegu.
Since the 90s, Korean CSOs have started to receive attention for its advocative activities. However, CSOs such as Daegu YWCA and Daegu YMCA have been constantly active since the colonial period to the present. To study
the long term persistence of CSOs in Daegu region, this article closely examined about 100 years of activities held by Daegu YWCA and Daegu YMCA as a case study.
This article carried out in-depth interviews with activists who led CSO activities since the 90s. In-depth interviews are limited to internal evaluation and this article has searched college students'' image to balance the external evaluation and objectivity. This article examined the sustainability comparing the subjective evaluation of the activists and objective evaluation of college students within the Daegu. Also, nationality, modernity, and citizenship were conceptualized to measure the degree of accomplishments of the social tasks of each period.
The main findings of this research can be summarized as the following five points ; 1) each CSO activities fully reflected and realized social tasks of each period. Activities carried out by Daegu YWCA and Daegu YMCA all reflected nationality, modernity and citizenship in each period. Nationality and modernity were noticeable for activists in 90s.
2) it has continued persistently throughout 9 decades including tough times. Daegu YWCA and Daegu YMCA have continuously carried out education and the young man club activity programs. Also, each organization representing men and women showed noticeable gender differences in their activity agendas. Daegu YWCA has carried out social service activities for the underprivileged in society and promoted social change through education activities. On the other hand Daegu YMCA has carried out political activism.
3) The experiences of activists in the 90s proved that activists had higher aspirations for social change, evaluated their lives positively, and had clear direction on the cause of public interest. Some activists have involved in student/democratization movement and others have started CSO activities itself. Also these activists have perceived the conservativeness of Daegu as an environmental conditions and showed the will to expand civic space within it.
4) College students have perceived CSOs as important and good willed organizations, evaluated them as dynamic and innovative, as well as organizations that are efficient and contribute to societal development. However their experiences in participating in CSO activities and intentions to participate were low, which meant the evaluation was positive, while experience was negative.
5) Comparing the perception by the college students and experience of the 90s activists, there is a sense of skepticism about the sustainability of CSO activities.n because activists became overloaded and aged, and college students showed lower interest in CSOs.Taking these results into considerations, the sustainability of CSO activities in the Daegu region which have persisted for make then of 90years is now being challenged. Based on the major research findings, various policy intervention are proved to be required for CSO participation of college students