Rep. Moon Jae-in, head of the main opposition New Politics Alliance for Democracy, certainly knows how to let even his most fervent supporters down. The latest case in point was his proposal to increase the number of lawmakers from the present 300 to 400, during a party event Monday. Faced with a barrage of criticism, not only from his political opponents but media outlets as well, Moon hurriedly backed away: “I made the remark in a light, playful mood.”
Excuses are often worse than initial mistakes. Enlarging the National Assembly by up to one-third of the current size is hardly a matter a politician ― much less the largest opposition party’s leader ― can utter in a trifling way. Moon should have either pushed ahead with his words or not said them in the first place. Appearing rash or unreflective is taboo for a politician who seeks the presidency, not just once but twice.
That said, the optimal number of lawmakers in Korea’s single-house parliament is an issue that deserves serious debate. It is true the number of people a Korean legislator represents is rather high compared with other OECD countries, except for the United States and Japan. Some experts say Koreans should have up to 380 lawmakers to meet international standards.
By enlarging the parliament’s size, Koreans can have more ``specialized” legislators from various walks of life under proportional representation. As they will hail from regions, not provinces, the new system will ease the chronic regionalism between the southwestern and southeastern areas, while ushering in more women to the Assembly. There are also views that the extreme partisanship in U.S. politics is attributable to the relatively small number of senators and representatives to effectively represent the increasingly diverse opinions and interests of Americans.
So the Justice Party is right to seek to raise the number of legislators to 360 while freezing total expenses at the current level, meaning salaries and other costs per lawmaker will be cut by about 20 percent. This is a proposal not to be dismissed as just the tactic of a splinter group.
There is of course a prerequisite to turning the wishes of Moon and other proponents of a larger parliament into reality ― whether and how the existing one will be able to improve its performance drastically.
Currently, Korean lawmakers receive up to 200 million won ($181,000) a year, or five to six times the nation’s GDP, compared with two to three times for most European nations, and they enjoy about 200 privileges, including immunity from arrest. In a typical high-cost, low-efficiency system, however, these legislators often spend months without enacting a single important law, as they did in the latter half of 2014 mired in protracted partisan brawls. Not a few of these representatives think only of the interests of their electors ― and even the lawmakers themselves in glaring conflicts of interests ― rather than doing what’s best for the entire nation.
In short, too many of these legislators exist to serve not the people, but themselves. The National Assembly ― and politicians in general ― is at the bottom of 33 professions in terms of popular trust. Enlarging the parliament could wait until their ranking goes up at least into top 10 or so.