Deadlocks: Does government size matter?

The approval vote. The case of the vote of approval for the prime minister illustrates the nature of Korean politics well. As a part of the coalition agreement, the first action of the president was to appoint Kim Jong-pil as Prime Minister, a nomination that would then need to be ratified by the members of the National Assembly. This was a necessary move to consolidate the ruling coalition, as Kim Dae-jung's party could count on only 77 lawmakers and the coalition partner's 43 lawmakers. A majority (50% plus 1) of the National Assembly members’ attendance for the vote was needed to allow Kim Jong-pil to become Prime Minister. It also required two-thirds of the votes from those who took up their seats in the chamber when the vote was called.

In theory, this condition was not insurmountable. If the NCNP and the ULD succeeded in negotiation with non-party affiliated legislators, then the ruling coalition parties would need the support of just 13 out of a 163 opposition members belonging to the GNP. Kim Jong-pil could rely on personal connections with many members within the Grand National Party ranks. Many of them were in fact from his native Chungcheong province, including some from the same high school, while others were alumni from the same university. Some of them also used to work with Kim Jong-pil in previous parties, the Democratic Republic Party in the Park Jeong-hee era and the United Liberal Democrats under the Kim Young-sam administration. There was more than enough margin to reach a compromise. So why did they not reach one?

If Kim Jong-pil had become Prime Minister, it was thought it would damage the GNP in the following local election in June 1998 and the general election, especially in Chungcheong province, where Kim Jong-pil had loyal electoral support.Footnote ²⁴ If the GNP were to support Kim Jong-pil's bid as Prime Minister, this would appear as if the GNP accepted the legitimacy of the ruling coalition parties. This would also help Kim Jong-pil to gain stronger support from Chungcheong province. The National Congress for the New Politics had strong support in Seoul, Gyeonggi, and Jeolla provinces, so if the GNP lost in the following local election, this would give the Grand National Party a chance to become the party of Gyeongsang province only.Footnote ²⁵ Therefore, the Grand National Party had to fight for its own survival in the legislature. The main objective of the GNP was to break the coalition between the NCNP and the ULD and gain power again.

At the approval vote for the prime minister, all the legislators of the GNP were ‘advised’ to attend the vote but to submit empty ballot sheets. In doing so, the opposition party would avoid popular blame for not attending an important National Assembly meeting. At the same time, the empty ballot sheets would force the vote to be annulled. Within 20 minutes of the start of voting on 2 March 1998, the legislators of the United Liberal Democrats became aware that opposition party members were handing in blank ballots. The National Assembly descended into chaos, with the ruling party legislators asking to have the ballot declared null and void and the opposition instead demanding the voting be completed.

The vote was cancelled at the last moment and the president appointed Kim Jong-pil as a deputy (or an acting) Prime Minister on 3 March. It took nearly six months to arrange another vote, which in fact took place on 17 August. Kim Jong-pil became the prime minister gaining 171 votes of support in the National Assembly. However, this was only after political reorganization (Jeonggye-Gaepyeon) of the ruling parties, which attracted high numbers of defectors from the opposition parties. By then the National Congress for New Politics had 88 legislators and the United Liberal Democrats had 49 legislators. Except for one member belonging to the ULD, the members of the ruling party all voted to approve Kim Jong-pil as prime minister and by then the ruling party had managed to gain around 30 votes from the Grand National Party.Footnote ²⁶

The previous vote in February had shown that independent voting for legislators was not an option given the prevailing Korean political culture. The question arising here is of course how parties manage to control secret ballots. Considering that each party is home to different factions (e.g. regional basis, school ties), that party leaders discipline party members to coordinate party decisions so strictly is surprising. Chosun Ilbo reported that the committee of the Grand National Party announced that if any members voted to approve Kim as prime minister, the member(s) would be required to leave the party (as it happened in a handful of cases).Footnote ²⁷

When Cho Sun and Lee Ki-taek, formerly leaders of the ‘little’ Democratic Party, were excluded from standing as candidates in the 2000 elections, this confirmed Lee Hoe-chang's tendency to marginalize legislators holding dissenting views.Footnote ²⁸ This marginalization of dissent points to the lack of democracy in Korean party politics, where fear of not being allowed to stand again in elections acts as a powerful constraint on the deputy's behaviour. There seemed to be no margin for compromise or negotiation among party members belonging to different parties unless they defected from one party and joined another. Park No-cheol, a chief secretary of Jeong Hee-su, the Seventeenth National Assembly member for the GNP, mentioned that:

Too many bills, not enough votes. After Kim Dae-jung took office, the legislature was supposed to deal with an overwhelming 300 law proposals. The numerous conflicts and political crises in the legislature provided the Kim Dae-jung administration with the opportunity to legitimize its attempt to reorganize the whole party system. The ruling party managed to attract large numbers of defectors from the opposition parties and managed, in September 1999, to gain 160 seats out of 293 total seats, with 133 seats going to the opposition Grand National Party. Because of the opposition party's boycott of the National Assembly, this was occupied by members of the ruling parties, while the opposition party spent most of the time outside it. Until August 1999, meetings of the National Assembly were held 19 times from the 189th National Assembly Extraordinary Session to the 207th National Assembly Session; about half of the meetings were held either by the ruling parties or the opposition party who otherwise took to the streets protesting against the government.

In the eyes of the public, the government looked inefficient and unable to deliver its policies. Legislators only appeared interested in particularistic infighting and blocked each other's bills. While the budget bill and related bills were waiting to be approved, the Assembly Session was paralyzed for ten days, from 3 to 13 October 1999, due to the conflict over the media reform report. There were 112 bills still awaiting to be approved, which were all related to reform policies, including public subsidy bills, national security, human rights, etc.Footnote ³⁰ In this section I have shown that the enlarged ruling parties did not secure governability, as the opposition went on to protest outside of the National Assembly rather than attending the National Assembly meetings.Footnote ³¹ I have revisited what happened in the legislature and why deadlock occurred from the very beginning of the administration. I have shown that enlarging the size of the government was the main strategy adopted by the government to ensure governability. The strategy nonetheless failed, suggesting that other factors may have been hindering compromise and negotiation, in particular a highly disciplined, or more rigid party organization, as the next section illustrates.

Leadership

Parties in Korea did not create the leaders, rather leaders created the party. Party leadership is fundamentally based on perceptions of legitimacy and support from the majority of the followers. Panebianco argues that the legitimacy of leadership relies in the control of public goods (collective incentives) and private goods (selective incentives).Footnote ⁴¹ When the benefit is not distributed fairly enough, the legitimacy of the leadership is undermined. Looking into the party system in Korea, where the linkage between the state and civil society is limited, parties are unlikely to achieve an equal distribution of either public goods or private goods.

At the local branch level, the legislators fail to come up with policies reflecting the views of the majority of the people and tend to focus on some voters (generally relatives of other members) and not others. Thus, there are a large number of alienated citizens or voters who do not enjoy equal distribution of public goods. It is no different at level of the central party. The party is more interested in gaining power and, in order to do so, the leaders are busy collecting funds from a few conglomerates or interest groups than in chasing after the small dues paid by the majority of the party's members.

Kim Dae-jung won office with only 40.3% of the total votes, a mere 1.6% more than his competitor, Lee Hoe-chang. The problem is that his supporters were concentrated in the Honam (or Jeolla) region. Kim Dae-jung gained 90% of the total votes in Jeolla province 44.2% in Seoul, 43% in Chungcheong province, but only 13% in the Yeongnam (Gyeongsang) regions and 20% in Gangwon province.Footnote ⁴² He gained relatively high votes compared to the previous presidential election in Chungcheong province but this was due to the coalition partner. As scholars like Linz, Skach and Stepan, and Mainwaring and Shugart note, the dual legitimacy of the executive and the legislative branches of government structurally induces conflicts in the legislature.Footnote ⁴³ Kim Dae-jung gained legitimacy with a higher vote rate from the presidential election; however, the opposition GNP hardly sees itself as a loser, as it received much higher votes in the general election and therefore became the party with the largest number of seats in the legislature. This dual legitimacy created strains in the legislature for the entire period of the Kim Dae-jung administration. With small numbers of supporters, it started to govern, although the lack of legitimacy hindered the implementation of reform policies. The government was driven off track by the big opposition party nearly every time it tried to pass any new bills.

Another significant problem for political leadership in Korea is that presidential power and the ruling party's elite are not equal; the party elite are subjugated by the president. When the parties are not separated from the power of the president, this easily can lead to delegated democracy with leadership highly concentrated on the president and the president simply relying on his charismatic popular support to govern. This also leads to lack of legitimacy in the legislature, especially when facing an opposition party or parties with more seats in the chamber. Decision-making procedures as well as the right to select the candidates are highly concentrated in the party leaders. If the leaders fail to gain agreement in committee meetings in the legislature, the ordinary legislators barely have the right to vote according to their preferences but are required to follow the leaders’ indication. In the case of ruling parties, the party chairmen (Chongjae) do not have much power but they are more like delegates of the original charismatic leaders: Kim Dae-jung and Kim Jong-pil respectively. In the case of the MDP, the ultimate leader of the ruling party is the president. Therefore, above the party representative (mostly chairman, Chongjae) of the floor negotiation group, the president's decision is also crucial in the process of compromise and negotiation. Lee Yang-hee, a former legislator of the ULD, pointed out that:

This also hinders party leaders from compromising with the opposition party. The legislature cannot play its balancing role against the executive. The president occupies a pivotal place in the government and often dominates his own party. In the legislature, the ruling party is not free from the president's decisions and this hinders negotiations and compromise among the parties. The opposition party, of course, can aim to restrain the power of the executive but the ruling parties will not or cannot reach an agreement with the opposition on numerous pieces of legislation. This strict top–down hierarchy also matters in the process of negotiations and compromise. Once the decision has been made by the party leaders, the followers − that is, the ordinary legislators − will not vote against the party's decision. The reason is straightforward: to do so would mean no possibility to stand as a candidate for the following general election, no more promotion within the party and no more financial support from the party leader. In short, when legislators do not obey the party decision, they are punished in these and many other ways. Some are even forced to leave the party.

Factionalism

According to Panebianco, an analysis of dominant coalitions can be carried out in terms of the degree of internal cohesion, degree of stability, and the party's organizational power map.Footnote ⁴⁵ When the level of internal cohesiveness is low, the coalition is likely to be unstable. In the case of the Kim Dae-jung administration, this was not a dominant coalition in a Western parliamentary system, but a minority coalition facing a big opposition party under a semi-presidential system. So the government was not going to collapse as a result of investiture or a no-confidence vote and, no matter how much difficulty the government faced, it was highly unlikely to collapse during the term of the presidency. In other words, the period of political rule is institutionally secured. However, regardless of this stability, the Kim Dae-jung administration seemed to roll towards ungovernability from the start, as a result of the level of factionalism within the coalition and even within Kim's own party.

The high level of factionalism within Korean parties also hindered the consolidation of party organization in the country. The case of the NCNP, and of its oldest faction (the so-called Donggyo-dong faction), is illustrative in this respect.Footnote ⁴⁶ The members of Donggyo-dong have all been secretaries or colleagues of Kim Dae-jung since the beginning of his political life. When the government was launched, four out of eight executive members of the NCNP were from the Donggyo-dong faction, two were former lawyers, one was a businessman, and the other was a journalist. The leaders of the NCNP were mainly from the Donggyo-dong faction and played dominant roles within the party.

The NCNP leaders were highly dependent on President Kim Dae-jung and this relationship acted as a barrier in reaching an intra-party consensus. The dependency of the Donggyo faction on the president means the party itself is dependent on the president. It is also a fundamental reason for the personalized characteristics of the party. If the leader disappears, so does the party. In other words, loyalty to the president would undermine not only the internal cohesiveness of the party, but also the balance of power between the legislature and the administration. This also hinders creating mechanisms of compromise in order to address conflicts with the opposition party and coalition partner.

The factions within the NCNP were also divided according to high school alumni networks. With Kim Dae-jung (from Jeolla province) in power, some among his high schools’ alumni from Jeolla province were appointed to senior positions in the administration. High school ties are very important in Korean politics (and arguably in economy as well) as they provide one of the key networks in terms of employment and career development. Having school connections to a ‘senior’ who now holds an important office is a key ‘door-opener’ in Korean politics. For example, during the Kim Young-sam presidency, Gyeonggi high school (based in Seoul) and Gyeong-nam high school (based in Busan, Gyeongsang province) alumni enjoyed high status and positions in the administration as well as judiciary and legislature. Under Kim Dae-jung, the Gwangju high school, Gwangju Il high school, and Jeonju high school, all based in Jeolla province, gained pre-eminency. For the sixteenth general election all of the Jeonju high school alumni of the MDP members were selected as candidates by the MDP leader. Within the ruling party, the high school factions were divided into Jeonju, Gwangju Il, and Gwangju high schools alumni factions. These factions competed over leading positions in the administration, judiciary, and legislature, as candidates for the elections, and even in the army.Footnote ⁴⁷

The unfair personnel policy of the Kim Dae-jung administration undermined the efficiency of the organization and came under criticism by the opposition party. Kim Pan-seok argues that official appointments were concentrated in the president's hands and there was no professional human resource department in the party able to suggest highly competent personnel.Footnote ⁴⁸

During the Kim Dae-jung administration, each minister kept his/her post for an average period of 10.54 months – that is the lowest average compared to 11.45 months for the Kim Young-sam administration, 12.88 months for the Roh Tae-woo administration, 17.11 months for the Chun Doo-hwan administration, and 24.54 months for the Park Jeong-hee administration.Footnote ⁴⁹ This also illustrates that the Kim Dae-jung administration did not hold hegemonic power. The government could not back up its ministers against the opposition party or public opinion in the case of political disputes. It is obvious that, if the government cannot secure the position of a minister for even a year, the minister can hardly implement new policies. It was not only the short period of the minister's tenure that illustrates this point, but also the chief executives’ positions could not be secured for more than 14 months.Footnote ⁵⁰

The process of personnel appointment was not institutionalized, let alone open and fair. Instead, it was carried out through either factional connection to the president or party leaders.

Linkage

Unlike other types of parties, the cartel party does not link the state with civil society. When the party does not link civil society with the state, and fails to represent civil society it is more likely to represent a small number of elite interests and this eventually will lead to the erosion of legitimacy. Lawson argues that:

In other words, to secure a party's legitimacy and power in the legislature the party must provide linkages between the state and the citizens. When the citizens are alienated from participation, resource allocation, and developing policies, it is hardly likely to consolidate internal power with a wide range of support. Even if the lawmakers achieve a majority status through building coalitions, as long as elections are held for the party to be judged by the citizens, the ruling party will face the citizens’ judgement. However, apart from the election, citizens and sometimes even ordinary legislators are excluded from the functions of party organization. The highly centralized power among the elites fails to provide the essential linkage between the state and the citizens (see Table 1). Lawson argues that linkage matters when the party fails.Footnote ⁵² For Key, linkage means ‘interconnections between mass opinion and public decision’.Footnote ⁵³ Lawson emphasizes that creating linkages is essential in order to gain legitimacy and consolidate internal power. The party should remain in the core position between the state and the grassroots. Linkages between the two means that neither of them should be isolated from the other and the two should remain balanced. When the party wins office, the function of creating linkages between the government and civil society or citizens is crucial to gaining legitimacy and wide support. If the party fails to link with the state and the citizens, the ruling party would hardly find wide and strong support from the people, no matter how good the reform policies. The Kim Dae-jung administration failed to link itself with civil society. Leadership without nationwide legitimacy undermined governability during his administration.

Table 1.

South Korean political parties between the state and civil society

Source: Author.

Funding

According to the National Audit Report, the rate of dues paid by each party's membership is 0.5%. In late 1997, just before Kim Dae-jung took office, the New Korea Party and then ruling party officially had 3,723,138 members; however, only 22,793 members paid their dues − that is, 0.6%. The NCNP (by then led by Kim Dae-jung) had a 0.5% rate among the party members, the Liberal Democratic Party had 0.03%, and the People's Nation had a rate of 0.1%.Footnote ⁵⁴

Most of the electoral campaign in Korea is funded by the individual party candidate and the candidate mainly relies on self-generated funds, often from his own business or business supporters. Therefore, the number of members who pay party dues is limited. At the local level, no members pay their dues; rather, they are mobilized to attend electoral rallies and campaigns either through the use of gifts. Such gifts include watches, towels, meals, and sometimes tours to tourist spots. ‘The more money or gifts, the more votes’ is a popular saying in Korea. Citizens have no chance to play a more active role in politics because they have no opportunity to receive education and thus rely on the favours by local leaders, such as the redistribution of gifts and funds. According to an investigation carried out by the Chosun Ilbo, a candidate distributed envelops with 100,000 won in cash to 30 potential voters in a village meeting in Busan. Another candidate confessed that he had to give a minimum of 30,000 won in each envelop to try to woo potential voters; this increases to 70,000 won as the election day approaches. At the central level, parties receive annually 800 won per voter as an ordinary subvention. In the year of the presidential election and general election, an additional 800 won subvention is granted per voter. When it is the year with local elections that are held on three levels (Si/Do Council Members, Autonomous Gu/Si/Gun Council Members, Education Board Members) the subvention is given three times so it amounts to 1,800 won per voter.Footnote ⁵⁵ Half of the subventions are given to the floor negotiation groups and the other half is given to the parties on the basis of the number of seats in the legislature, the percentage of the national votes each party gained at the general election, and the percentage of votes each party gained at the local election. The subvention is given to the parties at central level.

Political donations can be made by an individual or organizations. An individual can donate from 10,000 won to a hundred million won or 5% of the previous year's income. A company can donate five million won or 2% of the previous year's income and organizations can donate 5 million won.Footnote ⁵⁶ The local party branches can raise dues, donations, or can carry out some other activities to raise income; however, they can only be subsidized by the central party and cannot receive subventions from the state directly.

The problem is that most of the local branches do not rely on membership dues but on the legislator of the area who is the leader of the local branch: in most cases, he is the only source of finance. In terms of dues (membership fees), only a very small number of members pay. In 2000, only 9.6% of the GNP's central income was from members’ dues, 13.1% from donations, and 61.5% from subventions out of a total income of about 34 billion won. The NCNP received 2.8% from members’ dues, 53.1% from donations, and 24.4% from subventions out of a total income of about 75 billion won. For the ULD, the ratio was 1.8% from members’ dues, 30.7% from donations, and 37.6% from subventions out of a total income of about 25 billion won.Footnote ⁵⁷ Overall, parties relied on members’ dues on average 4.4%. As the ruling party, the NCNP, had the biggest proportion of donations and the ULD, as its coalition partner, also seemed to enjoy more donations as well (see Table 2).

Table 2.

Central party income in 2000 (Unit: Million won)

Source: Adapted from Jiyun Sim and Minjeon Kim, ‘Hanguk Jeondangui Suipgujo Yeongu – 1997–2002 Nyeondo Jeongdang Hoegyebogo Jaryoreul Jungsimeuro [Revenue Structure of Korean Political Parties]’, Hankukkwa Kukjejeongchi, 38(3) (2002): 163.

In terms of party income, the difference between the ruling party and the opposition party is significant. The GNP had the largest amount of subvention (about 21 billion won) as a result of the large number of legislature seats compared to that of the NCNP (about 18 billion won). However, the total income was nearly half of the NCNP's income. This shows that political donors expect some benefit from their donations.

There is a higher rate of membership dues paid at the local branch of the party compared to the central party. But this results from donations by the members rather than from membership dues. In 2000, the GNP's 85,000 members paid 12.8 billion won in dues.Footnote ⁵⁸ This means that an individual member paid 1.5 million won on average. The NCNP's 6,300 members paid 10 billion won, that is 1.6 million won per head. The ULD's 3, 700 members paid 4.7 billion won, that is 1.3 million won per head on average. In the local branch, the ratio of the subvention received from the central party is relatively low at 23.5% for the GNP, 13.4% for the NCNP, and 4.5% for the ULD.Footnote ⁵⁹

As these figures show, the membership dues are not the same as the dues paid to so-called mass political parties in Western democracies. In Korea, membership dues are paid by very small numbers of members and parties are more likely to be dependent on legislators’ personal source of finance, donations, and subventions. Overall most of the party income is based on the small numbers of party leaders able to attract more donations at the party's central level and at the local level as well as the subvention and their own personal financial resources. To raise donations, candidates at the general election hold supporters’ meetings (Huwonhoe). The supporters’ meetings can be held in various forms, as illustrated by inviting people to concerts, a party for a book launch, or exhibition of the candidate's own calligraphy.Footnote ⁶⁰ Jang Seong-min, a former legislator, contends that:

Taking care of local voters' needs is a very important role played by the legislator who is the leader of the local branch. Each local branch spends an average of 10–30 million won a month on these sorts of activities.Footnote ⁶³ The main expenses for the local branch lie in taking care of the family events of local voters.Footnote ⁶⁴ Attending and sending money to a funeral or wedding is a part of traditional culture in Korea to help each other on a happy day or sad day; however, most of the legislators who have local supporters in their areas spend more than two-thirds of their monthly expenses in taking care of the potential voters' family events.Footnote ⁶⁵ Lee Yang-hee, a former legislator, has stated that ‘only a few who are in high positions have enough funds, especially in the ruling party. Ordinary legislators mainly rely on their very close relatives as supporters. Being a legislator does not have advantages economically.’Footnote ⁶⁶

However, this comment actually contrasts with other legislators I interviewed. A former legislator of the ruling party stated that:

This shows how unequally the funding is allocated. Pye describes such leadership as follows:

Similarly, the party leader takes care of the ordinary legislators with subsidies to sustain the local branch and to carry out electoral campaigns or appointment of the candidate in the next election or executive position in the government in the case of the ruling parties. What happens if legislators do not conform to this pattern of behaviour? Jang Seong-min, a former legislator, points out that: