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President Yoon Suk-yeol presides over a Cabinet meeting at the presidential office in Seoul’s Yongsan District on Feb. 21. (Yoon Woon-sik/The Hankyoreh)

South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol has emphasized a “stern crackdown on corruption” over the past few days with messaging that characterizes labor unions as groups that rely on “illegal” tactics.

His activities appear meant to establish a frame of “fighting corruption” with unions as his target — reminding the public of his history as a former prosecutor general while rallying his support base. Critics described them as reflecting distorted views on labor and a lack of political leadership.

Presiding over a Cabinet meeting at his presidential office in Seoul’s Yongsan neighborhood on Tuesday, Yoon made a reference to labor unions’ refusal to make their account books public.

In response, he emphasized that “labor reforms start with greater transparency in union accounting.” He also commented on issues of extortion and other abusive behavior at construction sites, which he said he would “eradicate at all costs during my time in office.”

In his remarks, he unveiled his term “geonpok” — a coinage that is short for “construction site abuses.” Yoon reportedly came up with the term himself, describing construction site abuses as a “form of organized crime against struggling members of the working class.”

As the Yoon administration enters its second year in office, the gist of its “labor reforms” has turned out to be a full-scale offensive targeting unions. Rather than looking closely at some of the longstanding issues in labor reforms — including those related to working hours, wage systems and labor dispatching — he has opted instead to stress the “rule of law.”

Analysts say that as the opposition majority in the National Assembly has placed limits on his ability to amend laws, Yoon’s aim is to use his “prosecutor” image to lay the groundwork for a boost in his approval ratings.

This is seen as reflecting the lessons learned from his consistently hardline response to a strike by the Cargo Truckers’ Solidarity Division (TruckSol) last year, which ended up rallying his support base and sending his approval rating back up above 40%.

In a briefing, spokesperson Lee Do-woon quoted Yoon as having said during the Cabinet meeting that the “most important business we must accomplish this year is to set right the basic order of the Constitution.”

“Unions must be normalized so that corporate value can rise, capital markets can develop, and many jobs can be created,” he was also quoted as saying.

Yoon also spoke about the illegal actions by employers described in a cross-ministry report published the same day on “measures for eradicating illegal and improper actions on construction sites.”

Summarizing the conclusions in a single sentence, he said, “Inadequate working conditions — including issues with illegal subcontracting and unstable income due to deferred wages — have been a factor leading to improper transactions between construction operators and workers.”

Analysts read this as a deliberately skewed message painting unions as the “enemy” on labor reform issues, which should rightly be resolved through consensus and compromise between workers, companies, and the government.

Yoon’s distinction between established and so-called “MZ” unions — a neologism for millennials and those belonging to Gen Z — was also interpreted as a ploy for his labor reform push.

After receiving reports the day before from ministers in related agencies, Yoon said, “Without an end to the abuses of the powerful unions, there is no future for the young people of the Republic of Korea.” The message appeared meant to instill an image of “fairness” — a sensitive issue for younger South Koreans — and use that as a driving force for implementing labor reforms.

Experts predicted the Yoon administration would use this sort of generational and structural wedge strategy in a concerted push to undermine organized labor.

Political scientist Lee Gwan-hoo said, “President Yoon’s use of the ‘generation MZ’ label appears to be an attempt to use the tactics of the Lee Myung-bak administration, which turned structural issues of regular and irregular labor into a generational debate.”

“Having seen the effectiveness of its hard-line TruckSol response before, the Yoon administration wants to generate further momentum so it can proceed with its reform tasks,” he suggested.

Jhee Byeong-kuen, a professor of political science and international relations at Chosun University, said, “In addition to a wedge strategy to promote ideological unity among conservatives, he is also trying to use the anti-corruption frame to promote his own political image of ‘cleanness.’”

“This is a matter that requires a dialogue process where they meet with the labor world to cooperate and call for self-directed corrective efforts,” he added.

“When they designate them as targets for investigation like they’re doing now, that’s the approach of a prosecutor, not a politician.”

By Kim Mi-na, staff reporter

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