hankyoreh

By Lee Tae-hee and Hwang Joon-bum, staff writers
For the general election Wednesday, politicians are predicting the fate of the ruling and opposition parties will turn around voter turnout of 55 percent, with anything lower favoring the ruling New Frontier Party (NFP) and anything higher favoring the opposition Democratic United Party (DUP).
The NFP are predicting voter turnout between 50 percent and 55 percent. Lee Hye-hoon, NFP election situation room chief, said at a Monday briefing that the rate was expected to be far above the 46.1 percent recorded with the 18th National Assembly elections in 2008.
Early on in the election, the DUP was predicted to win if turnout exceeded 55%. Now the benchmark has been moved to 60 percent.
Election headquarters chief Park Sun-sook said turnout is expected to be higher because of the strong rallying of NFP supporters. “We believe it needs to be closer to 60 percent to work in the DUP’s favor,” she explained.
A DUP official said, “We initially thought anything above 55 percent would work for us, but from all the rallying by the ruling and opposition parties it looks like it will have to be somewhere over 57 percent to 58 percent.”
An NFP official said getting a voting rate over 60 percent would require combining strategies of “putting the administration on trial” and presenting an alternative style of governance.
“We have the ‘trial frame’ this time around, but the opposition’s ability to produce an alternative hasn’t been tested, so [turnout] isn’t likely to go beyond 60 percent,” the official said.
An Apr. 6 voter survey by the National Election Commission showed 58.1 percent of respondents answering that they “definitely plan to vote.” A similar survey conducted at the time of the 2010 local elections found an active voter segment of 59.5 percent. On this basis, observers are predicting a possibility that the voting rate for Wednesday’s election will be similar to the 54.5 percent recorded with those elections.
So is a 60 percent rate out of the question? How high it goes depends on the participation of the so-called “20--40 generation.”
A look at generational voting patterns in nationwide elections since 2000 shows overall voting rates of over 60 percent in elections with a more than 50 percent turnout by voters in their early thirties. Those elections were the 2002 presidential election (overall voting rate 70.8 percent, early thirties voting rate 64.3 percent), 2004 general election (60.6 percent and 53.2 percent), and 2007 presidential election (63.0 percent and 51.3 percent).
Korea Society Opinion Institute senior analysts Yoon Hee-woong said notable differences could be detected in generational voting patterns for the 2006 local election, where the 20--40 contingent was relatively uninterested in politics, and the 2010 local elections, when the groups interest in the elections and politics was strong.
“If you take into account things like the growing political interest of the 20--40 generation, we could see higher turnout,” Yoon predicted.
The 2006 local elections, where the Grand National Party (now the NFP) enjoyed a nationwide sweep, saw voting rates of 38.3 percent for voters in their early twenties, 29.3 percent for those in their late twenties, 37.0 percent for those in their early thirties, 45.6 percent for those in their late thirties, and 55.4 percent for those in their forties.
But turnout for the 2010 local elections was 7.5 percent higher for voters in their twenties, 4.9 percent for those in their early thirties, and 4.4 percent for those in their late thirties. The end result was a comprehensive victory for the Democratic Party (now DUP).
Weather is another variable. The Korea Meteorological Administration is predicting rain across the country Wednesday morning, with a 60 percent chance in Seoul.
To date, no studies have examined the correlation between weather and turnout in South Korea. Politicians cite the “rule from experience” that poor weather on election day means fewer voters will turn out. But the KMA is also predicting the weather will clear up nationwide by noon.
　
Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]