Removal? Yes. Reconciliation? Unlikely
In its verdict on the impeachment of President Yoon Suk Yeol, Korea’s Constitutional Court ruled that he had violated his duty to safeguard the constitution by deploying military and police forces to undermine constitutional institutions, including the National Assembly, and infringing upon the fundamental human rights of citizens. The court characterized these actions as grave violations of the law and an unacceptable betrayal of the people’s trust. The claim that his declaration of martial law was merely intended as a warning or appeal in response to the extremely chaotic national situation caused by the opposition party’s legislative majority was thoroughly rejected.
The outcome of the court’s decision must be accepted by all citizens. The problem, however, is that the court itself has long ceased to be an institution respected and trusted by the public. Polls show that fewer than half of the population trusts the authority of the court — a situation entirely of its own making.
Since the current Ninth Amendment Constitution took force in 1988, Korea has seen three of eight presidents face impeachment trials, resulting in prolonged suspensions of their presidential duties. Two of those were ultimately removed from office. Under the single five-year presidential term system, whenever opposition parties have gained a parliamentary majority through midterm general elections, they subsequently initiated impeachment processes that amounted to a rejection of the previous presidential election results. Consequently, national governance became paralyzed, international credibility plummeted, economic dynamism collapsed and the daily lives of citizens deteriorated.
Many senior figures in Korean society now argue that all rights and wrongs revealed through the recent impeachment process, which concluded with the president's immediate removal from office, should be consigned to history, and that Korea must pursue constitutional reform to make a fresh start. They insist that now is precisely the time to reflect upon the raison d'état (reason of state) for the future of Korea. They stress the need to rescue our citizens and nation from the current political breakdown, ending the era of division and ushering in a new era of national unity. However, these statements sound hollow.
Can a country, whose political landscape was until yesterday mired in chaos, suddenly transform by removing one individual — Yoon Suk Yeol — from the presidency and holding a new election within 60 days? For any Korean of sound mind and conscience, the past several months since Yoon's martial law declaration, followed by his removal, have been emotionally exhausting — so disillusioning and repulsive that one could hardly bear to watch the state of Korean politics. Even the justices of the Constitutional Court, driven by personal opportunistic interests, exhibited numerous procedural irregularities during the impeachment trial. Is it plausible to believe that their unanimous 8-0 decision to remove Yoon, followed by a new presidential election within 60 days, will suddenly usher Korean society into a new chapter?
Korean society faces severe structural problems that will make it extremely difficult for politics to improve significantly beyond their current state. The primary responsibility for this situation, of course, lies with the political establishment. Former President Yoon and Rep. Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party of Korea (DPK), bear the greatest responsibility for driving the country to this dire state. Both lack the ability and moral qualifications needed to lead a complex country like Korea, which faces challenges on multiple fronts. Yoon played a key role in creating the current national chaos; now that he has been removed from office and will disappear from the political stage, his counterpart, Lee — a cunning and unscrupulous politician — remains firmly in place, fueling widespread mistrust and fear among a large portion of Koreans.
Koreans must contemplate more fundamental issues. Democracy is essentially a social contract — a collective agreement among all citizens who constitute a political community. Yet democracy is not sustained merely by elections and legal frameworks. It is perhaps the most challenging political system ever devised by human society, one that functions normally only when each citizen within the political community internalizes and upholds their personal commitment to it.
The genuine crisis facing the political community in Korea today is the disappearance of morality, conscience and ethics among its members — values essential for sustaining democracy. Korea is no longer united as a "community of values," but rather has deteriorated into a mere "community of interests," bound solely by individual or group self-interest. As a result, we Koreans find ourselves in a troubling situation where a politician like Lee Jae-myung — someone whose ethical and moral standards hardly measure up to those of an average citizen — is now aiming for the presidency. Is the DPK, as currently led by Lee, truly aligned with the spirit of Kim Dae-jung, a symbol of Korean democracy? Haven’t the genuine democrats who once adhered to Kim’s ideals either already succumbed to despair or long since abandoned his party?
Obviously, a significant share of the responsibility lies with Yoon and the People Power Party (PPP). While the DPK’s Lee may be a corrupt and morally bankrupt politician, that does not automatically make Yoon or the PPP virtuous. Supporters of Yoon might argue, “At least I didn’t support someone as evil as Lee.” But that argument doesn’t hold up. Even if they didn’t support Lee, they still supported someone who, while perhaps less overtly, was nonetheless deeply flawed and ethically compromised. If the Yoon they chose had truly been without serious problems, would the country be in this state now?
If the national chaos triggered by the reckless declaration of martial law by an incompetent president ends simply with Yoon’s removal, and the early presidential election held within 60 days turns into a mere ceremonial coronation of Lee — who also bears significant responsibility for the turmoil — then Koreans can expect no meaningful improvement or progress in their country’s politics.
Park Jung-won (park_jungwon@hotmail.com), who holds a Ph.D. in law from the London School of Economics, is a professor of international law at Dankook University.