Smart Take | Implications of Opposition's "Landslide" Victory in Korea's Elections

Video Transcript

• Implications of Opposition's "Landslide" Victory in Korea's Elections

  This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

  So what's interesting is that we're going to be seeing the South Korean president go into the next three years of his presidency, having an opposition-led national assembly, meaning that there will be three years where the president's policies will face additional scrutiny and may have a difficulty in face challenges passing through or for legislation domestically. 

  The current ruling party, the People People's Power Party of South Korea now has lost seats. They did not hold the majority prior to this election, but they have lost seats, indicating in some senses a lack of confidence or reduced confidence by the South Korean populace and that party's ability to focus on domestic politics and people focus policies domestically. 

  Interesting to note that, you know, these elections come about two years after this South Korean presidential election, which was one of the closest presidential elections in Korean history, the current incumbent president won by less than 1% of the vote. And what's interesting to note additionally, is that right now the opposition leader was the rival candidate of that presidential period. So we're already seeing aftershocks, you could say, or waves coming off of that presidential period that indicate the partisanship that's quite strong in the country. 

  There's possibility that there will be implications for South Korean President Yoon's foreign policy agenda and most importantly, on his docket and high on his policy agenda has been the US, South Korea, Japan trilateral relationship. We saw this partnership kick off last August with the Camp David summit in Washington, D.C. and there's talk about an additional summit sometime later this year. And so what's really interesting is that this has been heralded as an international success, and there's a lot of momentum within the three governments to push this forward. Unfortunately, has also faced some domestic criticism. And with this new outcome of the National Assembly elections, there's a possibility that this type of foreign policy engagement could be held at risk or even maybe considered at a higher level of criticism through the opposition party.