The Periphrastic Causative V-게 하다

If the fused suffix causatives are a closed museum of inherited forms, V-게 하다 is the living, productive machine. It attaches to any verb — and to adjectives too — with no memorization: take the stem, add -게, and follow it with 하다. 먹다 → 먹게 하다 ("make/let eat"), 가다 → 가게 하다 ("make go"), 기다리다 → 기다리게 하다 ("make wait"), 행복하다 → 행복하게 하다 ("make happy"). This is the causative you fall back on for the vast majority of verbs, which have no fused form at all, and it is the one to reach for whenever you are unsure. It is also subtler than it first looks, because a single form covers what English splits into make and let.

Formation: -게 on the stem, tense on 하다

The recipe never changes: stem + 게 + 하다. The embedded verb stays a bare stem-plus-게 — it does not take tense or politeness. Everything grammatical happens on 하다 at the end.

Past, future, politeness, honorifics — all of it rides on 하다: 자게 해요 (present), 자게 했어요 (past), 자게 할 거예요 (future), 자게 하세요 (polite command). The embedded 자- never inflects. This is the single most important mechanical fact on the page, and the source of the most common beginner error (putting the past tense on the wrong verb).

Because 하다 carries the load, 게 하다 works just as smoothly on adjectives (descriptive verbs), giving "make [someone] become [adjective]":

One form, two English verbs: make and let

Here is the conceptual heart of 게 하다, and the place English speakers most need to recalibrate. English forces a choice at the verb — you make someone do something (coercion) or you let them (permission), and the two are different words. Korean's 게 하다 covers both. 아이를 놀게 했어요 can mean "I made the child play" or "I let the child play," and only context decides.

When you want to force the reading one way or the other, Korean has small helpers:

• For coercion, add 억지로 ("forcibly") or 시켜서: 억지로 먹게 했어요 ("forced [them] to eat").
• For permission, the benefactive -어 주다 (…게 해 주다) or the verb 놔두다 / 두다 ("leave [them] to") pushes toward "let": 놀게 놔두다 ("let [them] play, leave [them] be").

Negative causatives: "prevent from" and "not let"

Slotting negation into the embedded clause gives two very useful patterns. 못 하게 하다 (or -지 못하게 하다) means "prevent from / not let"; 안 하게 하다 (or -지 않게 하다) means "cause not to / keep from."

The "prevent" sense is worth drilling — it is how Korean most naturally says "keep someone from doing something": 담배를 피우지 못하게 했어요 ("[I] wouldn't let them smoke").

게 하다 vs the fused suffix: indirect vs hands-on

For the minority of verbs that have both a fused causative and 게 하다, the two are not interchangeable — they differ in directness. The fused suffix (재우다, 씻기다, 입히다) leans toward direct, hands-on causation: you physically did it. 게 하다 leans toward indirect causation: you told, arranged, or allowed it, and the causee did the acting.

That one sentence holds the whole contrast: 씻기다 (fused) = I did the washing; 씻게 하다 (periphrastic) = I made the child do the washing. The same split runs through 재우다 vs 자게 하다 (tuck in yourself vs. have them sleep) and 입히다 vs 입게 하다 (dress them yourself vs. have them get dressed). Where both exist, pick by who physically acts. The parallel 게 만들다 ("make [someone] become…") is a near-synonym with its own shadings — see 게 만들다.

Marking the causee: 을/를 vs 에게 vs 이/가

How you mark the causee shades the meaning between control and permission, and depends on whether the embedded verb already has its own object. In brief:

• 동생에게 청소를 하게 했어요 — "I had my brother do the cleaning." The causee takes 에게 when the embedded verb keeps its own object (청소를).
• 동생을 청소하게 했어요 — "I made my brother clean." The 을/를-marked causee reads as more direct control.
• 동생이 청소하게 했어요 — "I let my brother clean." The 이/가-marked causee leans toward permission / less control.

The three-way system (and why you can't put two 를 in one clause) is laid out on causative case-marking. The takeaway for now: don't drop the causee's particle at random — the marker is doing semantic work.

Common Mistakes

1. Putting tense on the embedded verb instead of 하다. All inflection rides on 하다.

2. Dropping 게 하다 and just conjugating the plain verb. Without 게 하다 there is no causation — you end up saying you did the thing yourself.

3. Using 게 하다 where a fused causative is the idiomatic word. For "feed," Korean says 먹이다, not 먹게 하다.

4. Forcing a "make" reading when you mean "let." Bare 게 하다 is ambiguous; add 놔두다 for clear permission.

Key Takeaways

• V-게 하다 is the fully productive causative: stem + 게 + 하다, on any verb or adjective — the default whenever no fused form exists.
• All tense, politeness, and honorifics ride on 하다 (했어요, 하세요, 할 거예요); the embedded stem never inflects.
• One form covers both "make" (coercion) and "let" (permission) — push it with 억지로 (force) or 놔두다 / 해 주다 (let).
• Negation inside gives "prevent from" (못 가게 하다, -지 못하게 하다).
• Where a fused suffix also exists, the suffix is hands-on (씻기다) and 게 하다 is indirect (씻게 하다) — choose by who physically acts.