President Yoon Seok-yul Impeached: What Next for the PPP?
By LUKE CHON ‘28
After years of political polarity, arbitrary conflicts with opposition leaders and factions within his own party, scandal-ridden controversies regarding his wife, midterm parliamentary elections resulting in a landslide liberal victory, and an approval rating consistently sweeping below 40 percent, South Korean president Yoon Seok-yul was impeached on Dec. 14, bringing closure to a tumultuous period in power. Yoon’s impeachment followed after a disastrous declaration of martial law, the temporary enactment of complete military oversight, plunging the nation into days of mass civil protest and leading citizens to rethink the future of Korea’s democracy.
On Dec. 3, 2024, President Yoon, a conservative, declared martial law for the first time in 45 years, an extraordinary, absurdly miscalculated late-night address on national television, citing a growing influence of “shameless” anti-state and pro-North Korean forces and a “paralyzation” of state administration from the liberal left. Six hours later, a combination of rushing lawmakers, clamoring protestors, and confused military patrol gripped the nation, encouraging Yoon to revoke his declaration, yet failing to suppress what appeared to be the outpouring of a years-long accumulated distaste for the now-impeached president.
Martial law is associated with a grim core of national history that detaches itself from the contemporary and technological society Korea is renowned for today. Post-war Korea was steeped in poverty and divided into a North and South, the seeds amounting to the painful 1950-1953 Korean War. Yet, a series of dictatorships, although undeniably oppressive, steered the nation to an export-driven economy, creating industrial markets and dramatically upscaling the financial and economical standard. The nation was progressing unimaginably, and public dissent was hastily cracked down on through martial law rulings. Violence escalated in the 1980s, most notably during the Gwangju Uprising, when pro-democratic student and civilian rioters were brutally killed by the military, sending shockwaves throughout the country. Democracy was achieved, but with immense costs.
South Korea’s political climate has sourly declined in recent years, riddled in deep political chasms that have disillusioned the people from the parties representing their cities and towns. The Korean National Assembly, the only chamber of Korea’s unicameral parliament, is dominated by the liberal DPK (Democratic Party) and the conservative PPP (People’s Power Party), led by Yoon. In April of 2024, Korea’s midterm parliamentary elections saw the DPK, spearheaded by the ‘firebrand’ liberal Lee Jae-myung, clinch an unprecedented 175 seats of the 300 total, confirming a landslide victory for the party adversarial to the incumbent. The PPP won a mere 108 seats, signifying a huge loss of power and engraving caveats for the discord, stagnation, and political inefficiency commonplace in recent Korean history.
Yoon’s tenure has been condemned for several prominent reasons. A parochial, obstinate stance on his policies have led to a frustrating tendency to veto any bill proposed by the opposition party as well as numerous DPK attempts to impeach Yoon on wide-ranging causes beyond martial law. Ironically, he had previously canvassed for and vowed to achieve a “Big Tent Government,” one that would encompass a spectrum of ideologies and beliefs, yet such a promise remains unsatisfied.
In addition, Yoon’s policies generally aimed to further US and international relations rather than expand on domestic ones, while his amicable relationship with Korean conglomerates (‘chaebol’) and their leaders contradicted many agendas. Glorified images of Yoon as a stubborn president evading the pressing issue of plutocracy and the monopolization of markets in modern Korea worsened as his term stuttered on.
Now, after nearly two weeks of havoc in the capital, consisting of riots at the National Assembly, a travel ban placed on him and his cabinet, an unsuccessful suicide attempt by his ex-defense chief during detention, and defamation of “K-Pop, K-Drama, and now K-Protest” circulating worldwide, Yoon’s impeachment characterizes a bleak future and a shifting tide in Korean politics. Power for now is trusted upon Prime Minister Han Duck-soo until Yoon’s case is evaluated by the Constitutional Court, a major department embedded within the judiciary branch, which could take up to six months. The PPP has borne the affectionate nickname of “People’s Treason Party” in light of President Yoon’s declaration of martial law. With a weakened parliament and the polarizing residue of an impeached president exacerbating its name, conservative Korea confronts a dire situation. What next for the PPP?
One can liken the crisis unraveling in Korea to the landslide presidential victories of the United States, most potently under the Ronald Reagan administration in the 1980s. Reagan, a republican had toppled the then incumbent and democrat Jimmy Carter, securing a staggering 469 electoral votes and the vast class of citizens deeply frustrated with Carter’s administration, which was inconsistent, lacked a clear-cut model for policy, and clung onto a global humanitarian outlook that concluded his term with an energy crisis and international strife, such as the Iranian Hostage Crisis. Republicans dominated the political landscape for 12 years until Bill Clinton, embodying a “New Democrat” ideal, mapped out the principles of a reoriented democratic party, broadly appealing to the masses and resulting in a crucial victory.
The People’s Power Party’s obvious next steps are to address weaknesses within its party and sober up its image. In 2016, Park Geun-hye, the daughter of dictator Park Chung-hee and first female Korean president, was impeached on claims of conglomerate extortions. Korea’s ‘chaebol’ monopolization is a lingering social predicament: family-run companies like Samsung, LG, Hyundai, and alike are untouchable in status and prestige, creating greater employment, economic, and business issues. Both Park and Yoon failed to finesse the ‘corruptive’ nature of Korean conglomerates, despite attributing it as a focal point of their campaigns. Conservatism in Korea has always fostered pro-business, pro-globalization, and pro-NATO ideals. However, reorientation is necessary, and the PPP should model a revised conservative profile, similar to the “New Democrat.”
Lastly, the liberal faction of Korea suffers from its own controversies. Lee Jae-myung, chairman of the DPK and Yoon’s most salient political rival in recent day, has been accused of violations of election laws and illegal cash remittances to North Korea. His eccentricity and vulnerability to separate charges does not provide a clean slate for the DPK either, partly why many Koreans young and old don’t align with either party. The PPP should strive to regain credibility and pursue adaptive political measures, one that, like Clinton, reshapes an agenda to match with modern political waves, while offering a counterweight to the radicalization of the liberal left.
Although much remains to be seen, the survival of the PPP and, to a greater extent, conservative politics in Korea, ultimately rests on future leaders and what they have to bring for the Republic of Korea.