hankyoreh

Park Geun-hye of the Saenuri Party (NFP) was elected on Dec. 19 as the 18th president of South Korea and the country’s leader for the next five years. Her victory means that by the time her term ends, conservatives will have held power for a decade since Lee Myung-bak took office in 2008. The public chose to hand the reins over to Park for another five years of Saenuri Party rule. There are other noteworthy aspects of her election: she becomes the country’s first female president, and she and Park Chung-hee (president from 1962 until his 1979 assassination) become the first father and daughter to both hold the post.

It was a tightly contested elected with the Democratic United Party’s Moon Jae-in, and Park’s triumph shows just how imposing the conservative barrier is in South Korea. Evidence of the country’s conservatism was apparent in the dramatic distortions of public opinion by conservative newspapers and broadcasters, as well as deeply rooted regionalism and generational gaps. The reason Moon lost the election - at a time when anger at the Lee administration and hopes for a change of administrations were higher than ever - is that the opposition failed to win the public’s trust. Having shown no real signs of change since its parliamentary election defeat this April, it was unable to win over the moderates.

The most urgent task facing President-elect Park now is uniting a divided country. The election was nearly without precedent in how united a front conservatives and progressives both presented. It is impossible to truly call either side the victor when a country is so clearly split in half. It is, rather, a half-and-half mixture of victory and defeat. This is why politics, now more than ever, need to be geared toward unity and shared benefits. It is not enough to set up some organization and stick a few politicians in it. The winner should consider the wishes of the half of the public who voted for her, but she also needs to tend to the half who didn’t.

Doing this will require her to be a leader for unity, someone who communicates and listens. She needs to listen seriously to the people and groups who disagree with her, reflecting their ideas in her governance approach when it is warranted. She also needs a mixed group around her to keep her aware of everything the public is feeling. What she must not do is be a divisive leader who applies standards of ideology and favoritism. She must keep in mind that uniting the hearts and minds of the public is the most crucial step toward reviving the country’s destiny.

She also must not confuse her own victory with a validation of the vices and regressive practices of the Lee Myung-bak administration. She has repeatedly said she intends to fix anything she sees as wrong by that government. Even the people who voted for her most likely did not want another five years of Lee Myung-bak. Under him, the prosecutors have faced an unprecedented crisis, broadcasting has stagnated terribly, and democracy and human rights have taken huge steps backward. Some cynics see Park’s election as the coronation of a dictator’s daughter, and this too is something she will have to overcome. The first step in disproving these charges, showing herself to be a wholesome leader of a democratic society, will be for her set democracy right by enacting prosecutorial reforms and restoring normalcy to television broadcasting.

Even though Park is a conservative, her victory owes a lot to her embracing a progressive agenda on areas like economic democracy and welfare. As in April’s parliamentary elections, she came out with a relatively progressive platform on issues like chaebol and social services. The reason is obvious: fixing South Korea’s polarization problems and realizing economic justice are historical demands that cannot be denied. Park’s determination to actualize economic democratization was called into question during the campaign, and as President-elect she needs to reaffirm her will to enact real changes, working to establish a fair and just economic order.

As a candidate, Park promised to work for the livelihood of individual families. She made several pledges aimed at reversing the collapse of the middle class and ushering in an era where it accounted for 70% of the population. These included writing off household debt, providing a 100% guarantee from the state for treatment costs for four major illnesses, offering free child care for infants and small children, and halving tuition costs. Given all the emphasis she placed on being a politician who keeps her promises, she will need to spare no efforts in tending to the public’s needs.

This election saw an outpouring of popular hopes for new politics. This phenomenon of unprecedented scale was best illustrated by the massive popularity of independent candidate Ahn Cheol-soo. Moon and Park both pledged to make changes to answer the public’s call, variously promising to assign more presidential responsibilities to the prime minister, legislate popular vote primaries, set up a permanent special prosecutor system, and institute a special inspector system to root out corruption by presidential relatives and associates. In cases where both candidates agreed, Park should waste no time in taking legislative action. But while the law and institutions are important in changing politics, fixing the political culture and practices is even more crucial. Park was constantly under fire for what critics called her authoritarianism and self-righteousness. Hopefully, she will now selflessly lead by example.

Another major task she faces is turning around the death spiral in inter-Korean relations that has been unfolding over the five years of the Lee administration. This will require a proactive stance of working closely with allies while maintaining a tight grip on the initiative in North Korea policy.

During her campaign, Park said she would “tend closely to the public’s needs like a mother of ten determined not to let the children go hungry.” Her promise was that as the first female president in South Korean history, she would adopt a “maternal” approach to her leadership. While it may be important for her to tackle the business left unfinished by her father, she should also look to her mother, Yuk Young-soo, as a model of warm leadership. As president, we hope she is more like Yuk than her dictator father - reaching out and offering solace to every South Korean.

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