If history is anything to go by, President Moon’s North Korea policy won’t be enough to offset public frustrations with a sluggish economy, writes Eun Hee Woo.
Author: Eun Hee Woo, Freie Universität Berlin
South Korean President Moon Jae-in’s much praised North Korea policy is in jeopardy. Moon’s North Korea policy has been widely deemed a success. But unless he gets a handle on his country’s many domestic economic woes and boosts his approval rating, further progress with North Korea will be almost impossible.
Approval ratings are exceptionally important for South Korean presidents to maintain authority within their own ruling party and delay the almost inevitable arrival of lame-duck status, which leaves them politically paralysed. But the most important factor determining a president’s popularity is economic performance.
Many South Koreans list Cold War dictator Park Chung-hee as their favourite president because national GDP nearly quadrupled during his reign from 1961 to 1979. Rapid economic development, proudly referred to as the ‘Miracle on the Han River’, served to legitimise Park’s dictatorship despite grave constitutional violations. As long as the economy is booming, most other failures and transgressions are readily forgiven by the South Korean people.
Roh Moo-hyun is remembered as South Korea’s most democratic president — a clear contrast to Park Chung-hee. Although he went to great lengths to dispel an authoritarian legacy and instill democratic values, Roh’s approval rating dropped from 60 to 20 per cent in his first year and never fully recovered.
Some have concluded that this drop was intimately tied to the public’s economic anxiety. President Roh’s failure to stabilise property prices and reduce economic polarisation made his support base, and consequently his party, turn their backs on him. Let down by Roh’s failed economic policies, the public elected the conservative candidate Lee Myung-bak — one of South Korea’s most famous entrepreneurs.
