Opinion - The Korea Times

Rhetoric and Tension

By Tong Kim We witness a repeat of history in the Korean Peninsula with the emergence of renewed confrontation. Tension is escalating again between the two Koreas. Following a series of gratuitous statements from some of the key officials of the new government, North Korea appears to have decided to discontinue its dialogue with South Korea and is ready to be cut-off from South's provision of aid. Yet, there are ways to defuse the current tension and to go back to the engagement track for inter-Korean cooperation for peace and reconciliation toward the eventual goal of peaceful reunification. Despite its threatening bluster at the South, North Korea said it ``would still do its best to keep the June 15 era of reunification going." President Lee Myung-bak said his government wants to have ``genuinely sincere dialogue with North Korea, with open hearts and not for a strategic interest to exploit from each other." Before we discuss possible remedies, we should look in to what led to this unfortunate situation. The root cause could well be North Korea's intransient policy agai

Apr 6, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Red Flags for Lee Myung-bak

By Tong Kim Only one hundred days after the election of Lee Myung-bak and only one month after the inauguration of his ambitious government, there have emerged some early warning signs for President Lee. We all know the president is diligent and dedicated to his daunting job of running the country. We have seen him issue stern instructions to his staff and his cabinet to effect change and to adopt a "pragmatic" policy approach. But change in government requires more than the leader's will. When Harry S. Truman was turning over his executive power to Dwight E. Eisenhower in 1953, Truman used to say: ``He'll sit here and he'll say, 'Do this! Do that! And nothing will happen. Poor Ike - it won't be a bit like the Army.'' In a similar vein, the bureaucrats whom the former business executive should work with are the seasoned survivors of regime change who are not like the high-salaried corporate employees who can be fired for unsatisfactory performance. The bureaucrats have a culture of resistance to change. Control of the bureaucrats is one thing and motivating them to work fo

Mar 23, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Alliance and North Korea

By Tong Kim Despite the appearance of a stumbling start ― suffering a moral damage from the impropriety of some cabinet nominees, the new government of President Lee Myung-bak is getting settled to undertake its promised challenge of ``serving the people" and building "a first class advanced country." And the whole nation is watching how he will rise to the occasion. Perhaps the two most important things for any president are to protect the safety of the people and the country from harm, foreign or domestic, and to provide an enhanced equitable well-being for the people. In short a president's job is to ensure that the people can live well in peace. The Korean people have confidence in President Lee's ability and interest to help turn around the economy even at a time when oil prices are souring up and the other external economic conditions ― including the collapse of the housing market in the United States ― are unfavorable to the Korean economy. Sleeping only five hours a day, the ex-CEO president seems to adopt a "spoke management style" that skips a cumbersome layer

Mar 9, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Irony of Roh Moo-hyun

By Tong Kim With the inauguration of the new government, former President Roh Moo-hyun has returned to a private citizen. It may be premature to assess the legacy of his presidency from a historical perspective. Yet there are some valuable lessons for the incoming administration to learn from the past five years of democratic experiment in Korea. Five years ago the reformist Roh government started with the thematic self-characterization of ``participatory government," in which the people would be encouraged to participate in the decision making process for national affairs. The Roh government began with the support of a 90 percent approval, which quickly came down to 40 percent in six months, then to its lowest of 18 percent ― after North Korea's nuclear test, and it ended with 31 percent at its departure. Throughout the period of his rule, Roh isolated himself from the people by surrounding himself largely with ``code sharers" who held the same views as his, often rejecting to consider challenging views. His government was not a participatory government that it

Feb 24, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Challenges for Lee Government

By Tong Kim In the midst of great expectations and some apprehensions the new Lee Myung-bak government will be inaugurated on the 25th of this month to begin an ``era of people's success.'' I join all well-wishers, including those in the U.S. Congress who recently passed a congratulatory resolution on Lee's election, in supporting the incoming administration of the Republic of Korea. Before taking over the reigns of rule, the president-elect and his transition team have been working very hard on an ambitious agenda. The assessment of their effort so far fares generally well but not without some blunders. According to one poll cited by an editorial in the Chosun Ilbo last week published under the title of ``Fatigue With New Government Before It Starts,'' Lee's approval rate has fallen to 60 percent from 70 percent since his election, while the transition team received a 50 percent approval rate for its job performance. Perhaps such mixed results were caused by the dashing speed and excessive enthusiasm with which the transition team churned out a massive list of policy

Feb 10, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Uncertainty of Inter-Korean Ties

By Tong Kim Most people do not talk about North Korea nowadays. The South Korean public is anxiously waiting for a final selection of the next administration's cabinet members, including its prime minister, whose numbers will vary depending on the National Assembly's approval of President-elect Lee Myung-bak's sweeping proposal for government reorganization. In the United States, no candidate in the Republican or Democratic presidential primaries has spoken about the North Korean issue. The war in Iraq, however, is an important election issue. Beyond that, the candidates are more focused on the economy, health plans, education, social security, immigration and other domestic issues. North Korea seems to have been relegated to the backburner again. North Korea has been uncharacteristically quiet on Lee's election, since it had signaled on the eve of the election its preference to cooperate with a new South Korean government on economic and other inter-Korean issues. Pyongyang is closely watching the changing strategic environment on the peninsula with an emerging cons

Jan 27, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Power Transition

By Tong Kim President-elect Lee Myung-bak has been busy, working hard to prepare for the right start of his new government due for inauguration on Feb. 25. Elected by a landslide with a record margin of more than 5 million votes over his closest challenger Chung Dong-young, there is no doubt that he has a mandate to lead the country according to his own policy vision for the next five years. A telling message from the last presidential election is good news for all: ``Democracy works in Korea and rule of law has become one of the basic tenets for politics. Korean democracy is mature and strong. The strength of democracy for good or bad is that people can change their rulers if they do not like them. During the campaign period candidate Lee Myung-bak made several pledges to carry out as President. It is normal to make attractive campaign promises in a democratic election, even if some of them might not be realistic or desirable, as long as they are cleverly designed to enlist the voters' support. Now that the election is behind, the president-elect ― soon to be Presid

Jan 13, 2008By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Game Is Over?

By Tong Kim Virtually every prediction from election polls and personal views of those interested or involved in election campaigns says Lee Myung-bak will be the winner Wednesday as the next president of South Korea. To disprove this pervasive prediction, it will take an almost impossible offset such as Harry Truman's victory over Thomas Dewey in the 1948 American presidential election, when The Chicago Tribune, a Republican paper then, printed DEWY DEFEATS TRUMAN on the election night. In theory and practice nobody really knows the result until there comes a point in the ballot counting when the leading candidate has received enough votes to win without opening the remaining ballots cast. Unlike the United States that has had problems with ballot casting and counting because of different time zones, Korea is in the same time zone, and the moment of the truth will instantly be revealed when the victory point is reached. Chung Dong-young is fighting back hard to the last minute with the best of his ability and all available tactics ― including normally effective negative

Dec 16, 2007By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Lee Myung-bak’s Foreign Policy

By Tong Kim Unlike a few months ago foreign policy platforms ― including positions on North Korea and the U.S.-Korea alliance ― do not really seem to matter now as the presidential election is closing in. The campaigns issues are focused on the economy, education and corruption charges away from the issue of peace and security. Mudslinging is rampant as expected. There seems to be no high road in this election. The average voter does not seem to support a candidate on a merit basis but on the basis of emotional disapproval against a candidate. Foreign policy issues suffer from a downgrading of priority in the press. Any significant development on inter-Korean development or denuclearization hardly gets printed on the front pages of newspapers nowadays. The voter's interest in foreign policy seems to have declined as an effect of diminishing return from a steady progress on the North Korean front since the Feb. 13 agreement in the six party talks. People seem to take the hard won progress for granted. After last October's inter-Korean summit, the implementati

Dec 2, 2007By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Unpredictable Presidential Election

By Tong Kim Only a month ago, I wrote in this column that people were not excited about the presidential election because unlike in the past there was no vital national campaign issue such as democratization, and no inspiring candidates offering a vision and hope for the nation. I was wrong. The election has now turned into a fascinating suspense drama, because of unpredictability stemming from new critical variables. Until recently it was a prudent assessment that the Grand National Party (GNP) candidate Lee Myung-bak would win the election as his robust support ratings continued to show a triple or double margin over his opponents. Now the situation has drastically changed with the emergence of two ominous challengers: Lee Hoi-chang and Kim Kyung-joon. Running as an independent, Lee Hoi-chang, a former GNP leader who failed twice in his presidential bid, is effectively eroding the former Seoul mayor's conservative base of support. Kim, a onetime business partner of Lee Myung-bak, is threatening the viability of Lee Myung-bak's candidacy. The whole nation is focusing

Nov 18, 2007By Tong Kim

Tong Kim

Read more

Rhetoric and Tension

Red Flags for Lee Myung-bak

Alliance and North Korea

Irony of Roh Moo-hyun

Challenges for Lee Government

Uncertainty of Inter-Korean Ties

Power Transition

Game Is Over?

Lee Myung-bak’s Foreign Policy

Unpredictable Presidential Election

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