An enduring debate among Korean politicians has been the utility and fairness of the kongchŏn, or the Korean committee-based party candidate nomination system. The system is generally considered to be unfair, to the point of being downright corrupt. With each election comes renewed discussion of how to change the system. Newspapers and the political parties ask: Would primaries be a better option? How open should the primaries be? To what extent should the general public be involved in the candidate nomination process?
Despite their longevity, the kongchŏn debates prove time and again to be merely political spin. Under the control of An Chŏl-su, Minju-dang has re-consolidated to form the NPAD, or the New Politics Alliance for Democracy. Part of NPAD’s promise to loyal Minju-dang voters was to reform the kongchŏn process, as both Minju-dang and Saenuri-dang had promised in the 2012 presidential elections. Earlier this month, NPAD party leadership convened press conferences and promised the public that they would fulfill their promises of democratic reform at last. An Chŏl-su even requested an audience with Park Geun-hye at the Blue House to discuss inter-party collaboration in eliminating the process. However, he received no such courtesy, and has since retracted the NPAD’s promise to reform the kongchŏn.
While An’s behavior is disappointing, it aligns with Minju-dang’s approach to kongchŏn debates in the past. The minority party (Minju-dang/NPAD) has used the kongchŏn debates primarily as a tool to portray the party as more democratic than Saenuri-dang. Some of this posturing comes from sincere belief in the possibility that promising more open candidate nomination procedures might sway some voters in favor of the minority party. In 2012, Minju-dang made a point of publishing committee members’ names and touting the democratic potential of a committee that included non-party members (but nonetheless prominent party loyalists). One committee member who was a prominent poet even published a long-form piece in the Hankyoreh on her experience screening candidates. Such an active PR campaign was a response to Minju-dang’s severe losses in the previous parliamentary elections. Saenuri had won a landslide victory in 2010, which prompted some sincere soul-searching in the upper party leadership. The result of this soul-searching was commanding that the committees be especially tough on corrupt incumbents and more supportive of underrepresented minorities. According to Minju-dang’s marketing campaign, the reformed kongchŏn committee represented change toward a more democratic future. Admittedly, that democratic future was one in which Minju-dang won more seats in the National Assembly.
The bizarre part of the story is that Minju-dang’s small adjustments to the kongchŏn worked. The 2012 National Assembly nomination committee was told to carefully scrutinize incumbents, and that committee threw out more incumbents than any past kongchŏn committee. The committee also selected heavily for women–though women only comprised 6.7% of the applicants, they made up 40% of the final nominees for parliamentary districts. Minju-dang then went on to win back most of the seats they had lost in the previous parliamentary elections.
NPAD picks up Minju-dang’s old political posturing. However, it seems that the party is wary of pursuing such aggressive measures in this year’s local elections as they did in 2012. The two major parties are locked in a stalemate in which neither one is willing to give up existing nomination procedures lest they suffer losses. Especially Saenuri-dang seems unwilling to give up its existing nomination procedures as long as they remain the ruling party. And beyond the “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mentality lies both sets of party leadership’s desire to maintain its hold on power. Kongchŏn is designed such that the party leadership have the final say on candidate nomination lists. Why give up a system that helps you secure your own power?
The question is what kind of shock would the parties need to change their candidate selection procedures. Minju-dang/NPAD’s grand experiment in candidate selection has failed yet again. How many more failures will it take before real change occurs?
References:
http://www.arirang.co.kr/Mobile/News_Detail.asp?nseq=160494
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/Article.aspx?aid=2987771
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/article.aspx?aid=2987925&cloc=joongangdaily%7Chome%7Cnewslist1
http://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/news/article/Article.aspx?aid=2987809900j vc9cj890
Interview MW1, Female member of Minju-dang’s 2012 kongchŏn commitee, conducted 19 February 2014
Wireless Peninsula 