CFR experts give their take on the cutting-edge issues emerging in Asia today.
After a historic election in South Korea, progressive Moon Jae-in is the country’s new president. Exit polls estimate Moon won 41% of the vote and conservative Hong Joon-pyo, his closest competitor, has conceded defeat, along with Moon’s other political rivals.
President-elect Moon Jae-in will take office in a South Korea that has been consumed by domestic politics resulting from Park Geun-hye’s impeachment and a compressed national election campaign. But now as president, he will quickly be forced by rising Northeast Asian tensions to reassert South Korean political leadership that has been absent.
Despite aspirations to enhance South Korea’s impact and voice, Moon will face a steep learning curve.
A return to liberal foreign policy
The Moon campaign template for foreign policy outlines a return to the liberal foreign policies that his political mentor Roh Moo-hyun followed a decade ago before conservatives re-took control of the Blue House.
The Roh Moo-hyun administration, in which Moon Jae-in served as chief of staff, pursued greater autonomy while maintaining the U. S.-ROK alliance, sought greater balance in South Korea’s position between China and the United States, and emphasized inter-Korean and regional security cooperation by fostering regional economic and political integration .
But a return to these priorities by the Moon administration face many obstacles that did not exist a decade ago.
New obstacles
First, the immediacy of Moon’s transition to power means that he and his team must switch gears from campaigning to governing within 24 hours. Moon will take office as president with a transitional government that will remain in place until a new prime minister and cabinet can win approval from a National Assembly that his Democratic Party does not control.
