Short Article
The New South Korean Government – Progressive, Moderate or Populist?

Lee Jae-Myung of the left-wing Democratic Party (DP) won the snap presidential election in South Korea with 49 percent of votes against the candidate of the conservative People Power Party (PPP), Kim Moon-Soo, with 42 percent of the vote and Lee Jun-Seok of the smaller conservative Reform Party as a third with 8 percent of votes. The snap election became necessary after former conservative president Yoon Seok-Yeol in the night of December 3, 2024, imposed martial law on South Korea only to see it withdrawn after a few hours. An impeachment of the president, who had been frustrated in his policies by the large left-wing majority in the National Assembly, followed. In 2022, Lee Jae-Myung was narrowly defeated by Yoon. Afterwards, he became DP president and started to bloc Yoon´s policies and impeached several of his civil servants and even judges. 

Lee Jae-Myung of the left-wing Democratic Party, the new president of the Republic of Korea (South Korea)

Official Election Presentation. Public Domain.

Who is Lee Jae-Myung?

Lee Jae-Myung was born in 1963 als fifth of seven children of a family in Andong, but he grew up in the new industrial town of Seognam near Seoul. He became worker and broke his hand in an industrial accident, which spared him conscription into the army. Later he could study and became a labor lawyer and democracy activist. 2005 he joined the left-wing Uri Party, predecessor of the DP, and from 2010 to 2018 was mayor of Seongnam, and afterwards governor of Gyeonggi province, the largest province of Korea. Being twice reelected in Seongnam and then becoming governor of the most populous province of Korea shows that people approved of his policies. In this time he started some signature populist policies, like income support for young adults, which he later also continued as governor of the Gyeonggi province, where he floated the idea of universal income support to alleviate income problems during the Covid pandemic. At the same time, a series of questionable policies led to continued accusations of corruption and misbehavior, and when in 2016 a major movie about a criminal mayor called Asura (“demi-god”) was released, many interpreted it as taking inspiration from the career of Lee Jae-Myung. However, Lee Jae-Myung was rarely condemned, and he himself interpreted the lawsuits against him as a retaliation by political enemies on the right. When Lee Jae-Myung lost the presidential election against Yoon Seok-Yeol in 2021, he searched for a candidacy to the National Assembly in the next possible by-election, and this was seen as a way to gain parliamentary immunity. In fact, though the DP had claimed they would not protect corrupt politicians against criminal prosecution, they refused to lift his immunity due to the allegedly political character of persecution against him. The last five open lawsuits have been indefinitely postponed, now that he is new president of the Republic of Korea. 

South Korea and Northeast Asia – a difficult balancing act between China, Japan, Russia and the US

One of the most important questions regarding his term is the relation to the neighbors. In the past, Lee was known for anti-American comments and a very critical stance towards Japan, while advocating for good economic relations with Russia and China. Regarding unification with North Korea, though not as enthusiastic a supporter of a détente with North Korea as previous President Moon Jae-In, he still was openly and sometimes less openly trying to establish relations with the North – one of the lawsuits was about alleged illegal transfers of money to North Korea through a business man, to connect to North Korea´s leadership. In the election campaign, however, Lee Jae-Myung coined himself differently, as a very moderate candidate and vowed to maintain a good relation with Japan. The South Korean-Japanese relations after the Japanese colonization of Korea (1910-1945) have, despite formal diplomatic relations since 1965, been very fragile. Arguably, the one lasting achievement of the government of Yoon Seok-Yeol was a re-start of relations to Japan not based on the – according to the Koreans, generally insufficient – atonement for the past, but rather based on joint outlook on the world as democracies, market economies and countries antagonistic to North Korea and, growingly, China. Yoon Seok-Yeol saw this as part of a Korean foreign policy not longer defined through the one prism of unification of the Korean peninsula, but rather as a middle power in a globalized world. While President Lee vowed to follow this outlook, and his second political phone call after the US President was indeed Prime Minister Ishiba of Japan, there are a lot of unresolved historic issues which could derail this policy. Just, as Lee became president, another court awarded a forced laborer of the war compensation payments by a Japanese company, a practice rejected by Japan, which sees all legal claims finished with the normalization treaty of 1965. Also, territorial issues about a small rock in the East Sea (or Sea of Japan), and other issues loom. The USA are the most important ally of South Korea. They are an indispensable partner for the security of the country, the most important trading partner and also related through millions of Koreans living in the US. While a Free Trade Agreement between both sides exists, President Trump threatens to raise tariffs, a threat which in the last half year the caretaker government could not adequately address. Also, the defense budget of Korea and the contribution to the costs of US troops in South Korea are issues of concern, and demands of America are a sharp rise in both. 

Equally important for good relations to the US might be the question, how South Korea defines its relations to the two big neighbors, China and Russia. China, the second and for many years first partner for trade and investment, already saw gradual Korean divestment from around 2016, when South Korea started to deploy the American THAAD missile defense system, which purportedly was a system to defend South Korea from the threat from the North, but was seen as directed against China by the Chinese side. Lee Jae-Myung always stressed the importance of good relations to China, and in particular good economic relations. But the US might want South Korea to be more firm in its stance against China. This however, would make it impossible to gain China´s support for denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, a goal, President Lee again reiterated in his first phone call with Chinese President Xi. A similar situation exists regarding relations to Russia. South Korean companies were eagerly doing business in Russia before the Russian attack on Ukraine. Afterwards, most business was suspended and South Korea gave generous aid to the Ukraine, though no lethal aid. South Korean companies sold record amounts of military equipment – tanks, howitzers, drones etc. – to Eastern European states fearing Russian aggression. In recent months, in anticipation of Lee´s election victory, many companies restarted plans to return to Russia. However, the involvement of North Korean troops in Russia and the still unclear path to a peace there hinder efforts of normalization. 

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A divided country – North and South and the inner-South Korean divisions

This brings us to North Korea. Since the division of the country in 1945 and the Korean War (1950 to 1953), unification has been an overarching goal for South Korean governments, and until 2024 also for the North Korean regime. While some governments, notably that of Kim Dae-Jung (1998 to 2003) and Moon Jae-In (2017-2021) tried to achieve détente, others, like the previous conservative government of Yoon Seok-Yeol, answered to North Korean military gestures with similar or even stronger gestures. Lee Jae-Myung will return to a policy of trying to achieve détente. One of the first measures he ordered was the end of broadcasting loudspeaker messages, which consisted of news, or sometimes K-Pop, to the North. Obviously, the North reciprocated by stopping the screeching noises described by people living in the border area as “noise terror”. But, besides this small, but positive step, it will be much more difficult to return to meaningful détente, since in 2024 Kim Jong-Un of North Korea ended the decades-old reason of state of North Korea to achieve unification, and instead defined South Korea as a “hostile state”, and both North and South Koreans as two different people. While North Korea also in the past sometimes had wild policy swings, it is much more difficult to come back to dialogue after this change in North Korean state policy. Nevertheless, observers of German division and unification might remember that from 1972 the situation in Germany was similar (though less hostile), when East Germany gave up the elusive goal of unification under socialism and instead proclaimed the existence of two German states. So, there still is hope to come from hostile cohabitation to peaceful cohabitation, and what happens later, no one can foresee. 

Lee Jae-Myung has not much time to proof his presidential abilities. Still in June 2025, at the G 7 summit to which he is invited, he will meet leaders of the Western world. Besides the foreign policy challenges there are also daunting domestic policy challenges: an urgently needed reform of the justice system is probably the most sensitive one, since it will easily be interpreted as a way to control the legal system by a former defendant. Also, the much larger question of a constitutional reform – like the introduction of a two-term, four year presidency, which many observers agree would be a better solution than the current “imperial” one-term presidency, is on the table. Until now, for nearly two decades opposition candidates floated this idea, but once elected, they all happily used the power possibilities the South Korean president has. Finally, and maybe most importantly, there is the question of living costs and growths. During the election campaign, Lee coined the term “moksanism”, i.e. policy to make food the main priority. But how can he reconcile higher profits for companies, more social welfare, more defense industry spending altogether? At least, Lee has a very comfortable majority in the Parliament, and a stillstand due to Parliamentary obstruction, which the last president complained about, will not take place. Ultimately, barely half of the Korean voters voted for Lee and the two (major and minor) conservative parties had slightly more votes. Therefore, President Lee has to bring together voters. Overcoming internal division will be his most important task, more even than division in North and South and the growing division of Northeast Asia in a new Cold War. 

About the Author

Prof. Dr. Bernhard Seliger is representative of Hanns-Seidel-Foundation Korea with projects in South Korea, North Korea and Northeast Asia. He is honorary professor at Westsaxon University and honorary citizen of Seoul and Gangwon Province.