(EDITORIAL from the Korea Herals on Aug. 20)

Changes and reforms

Changes in electoral and administrative systems over the past decades in Korea
were mostly limited to the increase or decrease of the number of National
Assembly seats and the redrawing of electoral districts. The introduction of
local autonomy with direct election of the chiefs of administrative units late in
the 1980s was by far the most important democratic change of the governing system
in this republic.

So, the geographical framework of national administration remained unchanged.
Rapid urbanization caused the designation of one special (Seoul) and six
metropolitan (Incheon, Daejeon, Gwangju, Busan, Daegu and Ulsan) cities and the
upgrading of many counties to the municipal status. But the centuries-old
three-tier structure of the central, provincial and county administrations has
been maintained despite the development in transportation and communications.
A broad consensus has been established among the political, academic and social
circles about the need to change the local administrative structure as well as
the political representation system. Parties have come to almost identical views
about the integration of counties and cities (into 60 to 70 larger units) and the
average size of their population (some 700,000). Abolition of the province-level
administration is commonly proposed by most groups.
President Lee Myung-bak triggered a hot debate in the political and civic circles
as he called for the transformation of the local administration structure and a
reform in the electoral system in his Liberation Day address on Saturday. He
focused on reducing the number of elections which he blamed for political
instability and ideological division of the electorate.
The president did not mention a constitutional amendment in his address. But his
idea of putting various elections together could involve the change of the
service terms of elected officials, hence it will require eventual revision of
the basic law (to reduce the presidential tenure to four years to match the term
of lawmakers).
Even the most conservative would find it difficult to refute the necessity of
reforms aimed to save the national political energy unnecessarily consumed in
frequent elections on various levels and to mitigate regional dominance by major
parties, the worst malady in Korea's representative democracy. But the greatest
hurdle is individual politicians' anticipation of disadvantage from proposed
changes.
Members of the majority Grand National Party believe that they will have to
concede many seats to opposition parties in the southeastern Gyeongsang provinces
if multiple-representation constituencies are introduced, whereas the
conservative party will still be difficult to penetrate in the southwestern
Jeolla region dominated by the progressive Democratic Party. Pointing to such
factors of resistance, President Lee emphasized that no reform will be possible
unless parties are prepared to suffer losses.
Given the sharply confrontational political environment, any group's initiative
for a change in the administrative and electoral systems, let alone
constitutional amendment, would further exacerbate political and social
antagonism. A step-by-step approach is recommended with parties joining in
non-political studies to streamline the nationwide administrative structure first
with thoroughgoing preparation by relevant government authorities.
This work could naturally develop into rearranging electoral districts and a
shift from the present single representation to the plural-choice large
constituency system. When this is achieved, the political community and civic
groups may open public debate on a constitutional amendment to reflect global and
domestic social changes during the past 22 years since the last revision. The
target may be set for 2012 when both presidential and Assembly elections are to
take place.
(END)