Democracy after Democratization: The Korean Case
The following entry is a review of Democracy after Democratization: The Korean Experience by Choi Jang-jip. (Translated by Lee Kyung-hee. Seoul: Humanitas press, 2005. Pp. 329.
| March 14, 2006 • Korean democracy, according to Choi Jang-jip, is in a deep crisis. Indeed, despite the remarkable and even “wondrous” transition to democracy achieved in 1987, Choi contends that the momentum for democratization has not only been lost, but is in danger of reversing itself. This is not to say that Korea will slide back into authoritarianism, or at least not the explicit authoritarianism of the Park Chung Hee or Chun Doo Hwan regimes. The danger, instead, is far subtler. The danger, in fact, has already been manifested in the development in South Korea of what Choi calls “conservative democratization.” To Choi, conservative democratization is a democracy largely without substance. It preserves the formal procedures and institutions of democracy—such as regular elections, competition among parties, and universal suffrage (what Choi calls “procedural mini-mums”) (13)—but it fails to provide a basic function of strong democracy, which, as the author explains it, “is to politically express and represent a variety of social conflicts and interests, and thereby organize alternatives to both expand the foundation of public participation and contribute to the stabilization of the political system” (21). With the crisis of Korean democracy as his starting point and central theme, Choi goes on to identify and analyze the basic reasons for the enervation, if not complete evisceration, of South Korea’s democratic hopes and dreams. |
Choi’s 329-page analysis of the democratization process in Korea is historical, empirically detailed, and extremely wide ranging; suffice it to say that I cannot reproduce the depth or scope of his argument in this short review. The gist of his argument, however, is fairly clear: to Choi, democracy in South Korea has been profoundly shaped and subsequently hijacked by conservative forces. Democracy, in Choi’s words, “has become an appendage to the existing structure of vested interests; politics have accordingly become the exclusive domain of upper class activities; and channels of political opposition to this situation have been repressed” (27). In a more mundane vein, Choi argues that the Korean political and social systems—and by extension, Korean democracy—has become dominated by the elite in an increasingly unequal society. The elite include the usual suspects: big business and politicians. In Choi’s view, moreover, the Korean press is especially culpable, since it sets the political agenda and “determines policy issues and priorities” in South Korea (41). At the same time, Choi is not hesitant to spread the blame: to him, intellectuals, especially university professors, make a lot of self-righteous noise, but in the end fail to address the central issues facing Korean society. They are, in short, part of the problem (48-9).
In many respects, all of these criticisms beat a familiar refrain—a point that Choi himself acknowledges. He points out, for example, that many other countries, including the United States, suffer from similar problems. Nowhere is democracy perfect, or even close to it. Choi, however, suggests that Korean democracy has become uniquely debased. From the country’s precipitous decline in voting rates—down to 48% in the local elections of 2002 from a high of 89.2% for the 1987 presidential election (22)—to its “monopolistic conservative party system” (277), Korea seems to out-do the world in the competition for democratic deficits. Choi’s criticisms, it is important to emphasize, are based on firm historical grounding. Indeed, this is perhaps the strongest part of Choi’s argument. In chapters 2 and 3, for instance, Choi shows how Cold War anti-communism and authoritarian industrialization established a social, political, and economic framework—one with deep institutional and structural roots—that has necessarily shaped the unfolding of democracy since 1987. It is a history that cannot be ignored. This becomes even more evident in chapter 4, where Choi begins by explaining how the grip of authoritarianism was broken only to be replaced an extremely hallow version of democracy. Of particular interest in this chapter is Choi’s analysis of Korea’s deep-seated and extraordinarily divisive “regionalism.” Choi argues that Korea’s regionalism is, at base, a politically created phenomenon—a product of the Yushin system of the 1970s (150), which privileged some regions of Korea while excluding others, most significantly Honam (Kim Dae-jung’s “home base”). Since then regional divisions have been manipulated for political purposes; thus, it is not surprising that regionalism has become a critical element of the country’s conservative democracy. Specifically, Choi argues that regionalism has weakened the party system and elevated elite interests over popular or mass-based interests. The logic here is clear: regional ties have effectively replaced typical bases of mass mobilization, such as class, vocation, and functional interests and cleavages (150-1). In this situation, parties do not have to—and, in fact, do not—compete on the basis of ideological or any other substantive difference. Choi uses this same basic logic to explain the extreme instability of the party structure in South Korea, especially the constant reshuffling and renaming of political parties. It makes for very interesting reading.
In the third part of Democracy after Democratization, Choi examines the impact of democratization on the state, the market, and civil society in chapters 5, 6, and 7 respectively. Given Choi’s negative assessment of democratic progress in South Korea since 1987, it is easy to surmise that his analysis here is bleak. Indeed, in chapter 5 he matter-of-factly declares that, in the case of Korea, “the most salient characteristic displayed by the state after democratization is its incompetence” (181). The problem, of course, stems partly from the nature of Korea’s conservative democracy, but Choi also argues that the state’s incompetence very strongly reflected a personal failing on the part of the country’s leadership. He is particularly critical of Kim Dae-jung, who in Choi’s view, lacked vision and will. This lack of vision and will also doomed efforts to reform Korea’s market structure, especially the dominance of the chaebol(Korea’s huge business conglomerates). To Choi, this failure was all the more galling given the external shocks brought to bear on the Korean economy by globalization generally and the Asian financial crisis (and IMF) specifically. While these two processes are often seen in a negative light, Choi points out that both put pressure on the chaebol, which hitherto occupied a nearly unassailable position of power in the economy. In chapter 7, Choi, in effect, puts the final nail in the coffin of Korean democracy. Here he argues that civil society in Korea has, “despite its expansion in numbers and size … brought the paradoxical phenomenon of weakening, rather than strengthening, democratic and liberal foundations” (267). The reason, for Choi, is easy to see: civic organizations have been unable to overcome the ideological hegemony of the vested interests from the old regime, including a strong anti-labor bias.
The remaining two chapters of Choi’s book are the conclusion and an afterword, the latter of which includes his thoughts on the election of Roh Moo-hyun in 2002 (the original, Korean version of Democracy after Democratization was published before the 2002 election). Roh’s election, unfortunately, has not changed anything in the eyes of Choi. In fact, he argues that the quality of democracy in Korea has deteriorated even further. Indeed, Choi asserts that, despite its leftist (and therefore progressive) appearance, the Roh administration is “more market- and growth-oriented” than any other government before it (304). One result of this has been the emergence of “super-chaebol,” a phenomenon that can only impede and distort the democratic process to any even greater extent.
Choi Jang-jip’s cutting and no-holds-barred analysis of Korean democracy can be assessed from a number of perspectives. It is certainly a deeply pessimistic portrayal, and one that has drawn criticisms from many Korean critics who believe it is far too harsh. As an outside observer of Korean politics it is difficult for me comment authoritatively on this issue. I can say, however, that there is nothing earthshaking about his pronouncements. Most of the criticisms he levels at the quality of Korean democracy are everyday fodder for critics, say, of American democracy. In fact, as I noted earlier, Choi acknowledges that similarities exist between Korea and other countries. Still, he strongly suggests that Korea is significantly worse off; that Korea’s conservative democracy is uniquely bad. This is debatable. And herein lies one of my strongest reservations about Democracy after Democratization: methodologically, Choi uses comparisons in an arbitrary, cursory and largely biased manner. It is a “pick-and-choose” approach that lacks rigor. Theoretically, moreover, Choi relies too heavily on classic works from the 1960s~1980s: O’Donnell and Schmitter, Hirschman, Przeworski, Rustow, Downs, Lipset and Karl. There is, of course, a great deal to learn from classic works, but there is also a growing and extremely vibrant newer literature, especially on democracy, which Choi left completely untouched and unacknowledged. Engaging more directly with the most recent scholarship would have, almost assuredly, provided a better and much stronger perspective on the “Korean experience.”
To be fair, however, Choi’s book is not a scholarly work per se (and it should not be read as such). It is, I surmise, intentionally designed to provoke thought and action on the part of Koreans who, from Choi’s perspective, have grown complacent about the democratic process. Indeed, Democracy after Democratization grew out of a series of public lectures he gave in 2002. From this perspective, Democracy after Democratization is well worth reading, but not just to understand democracy in Korea. It is worth reading as a general treatise—or, perhaps more accurately, polemic—on the crisis of democracy in an increasingly corporatized, consumerist, and ideologically occluded world. For, Korea is not unique. If anything, it represents a global trend in the hollowing out of democracy. This is not to deny a basic point made by Choi, which is that democracies “are not all the same” (14); there certainly are differences. But the key question may be: What are the similarities? Asking about similarities is important if only to better understand the role of agency in creating stronger democracies throughout the world. Can individual societies—still less individual political leaders—resist the pressures of conservative democracy on their own? Is global collective action needed? The answers to these questions are not clear, but they need to be addressed, I think, to better understand the prospects for stronger democracy in Korea.
Review by Timothy C. Lim
Associate Professor
Department of Political Science
California State University Los Angeles
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