 Korea under the late Joseon dynasty was seen predatory and rent-seeking, as it was marred by rampant political corruption that led to the decline of the Joseon dynasty which created a power vacuum that drew the Qing Dynasty and Japan to compete for influence over the Korean peninsula.Corvee obligations, excessive taxation, landlord exploitation, and peasant oppression contributed to Joseon Korea's gradual economic decline.The relative decline of Qing China coupled with a modern and industrialized Japan gave the Japanese to flex its newly modernized political and military muscles to occupy and colonize the Korean peninsula, a quest Japan had been trying to do for centuries.