Preferences on Security Issues and Ideological Competitions: A Case of the Korean National Assembly

Abstract

This article examines the distinct features of the ideological thinking and their impact on ideological competitions among the members of Korean National Assembly (KNA). In particular, it analyzes the influence of preferences on security issues on the formation of ideological self-identification and internal competitions of the KNA. By applying factor analysis, it shows that the issue attitudes among the members of the KNA do not converge into the ideological self-identification. In addition, preferences on security issues can be distinguished from the ideological self-identification among the member of the KNA and have an independent impact on their legislative voting behavior. These results imply that a more valid understanding of the legislative behavior among the members of the KNA could develop by specifying issue attitudes independently from the ideological self-identification.

How does party organisation develop beyond clientelism in new democracies? Evidence from South Korea, 1992–2016

“…The revised Rile index, compared to the original one, satisfies the face and construct validity of the ideological positions of the two major parties in that they are located on opposite sides of the ideological spectrum. While those identifications are consistent with the previous findings (Han, 2017). they are also more reliable if we consider the historical experiences of Korea.…”

“…While this unexpected ideological locations of the Conservative Party might reflect the party's distinct characteristics (Han, 2012), a more plausible guess would be that some of the issues used to differentiate the Right/Left ideological position by Rile Index might not be appropriate in the context of Korean politics. In this regard, it should be noted that studies which seek to measure ideological positions in Korea argue that Korean society is more likely to be ideologically divided along some political issues rather the economic or social issues (Han, 2017).…”

“…But, for analytic simplicity, this article follows the research tradition in Korean literature (see e.g. Han, 2017). The groupings in this study are constituted as follows: in the category of the 'Democratic Party' are the 'Democratic Party (1991-2007, 2008-2011, 2013-2014, 2015-)', 'National Congress for New Politics (1995-2000)', 'Millenium Democratic Party (2000)', 'Uri Party (2004-2007)', 'United Democratic Party (2007-2008', 'Democratic United Party(2011-2013)', 'New Politics Alliance for Democracy (2014-2015) and parties included in the category of the 'Conservative Party' are ' Democratic Liberal Party (1990)', 'New Korea Party (1995-1997)', 'Grand National Party (1997', 'New Frontier Party (2012-2017)', and 'Liberty Korea Party (2017-)'.…”

“…However, empirical evidence does not always confirm the unidirectional development of party organisation in new democracies. For instance, the convergence of programmatic appeals among political parties in Taiwan and South Korea (hereafter Korea) is not a stable characteristic, but parties frequently polarise away from one another depending on electoral contexts (Clark & Tan, 2012;Han, 2017;Moon, 2016). In addition, given the traditional clientelistic relationship between parties andvoters, the political market environments in which Asian political parties compete do not perfectly match those in which Western catch-all parties emerged.…”

The Korean Parox

“…There is an ongoing debate regarding the extent to which there is a real political divide in South Korea affecting the country's foreign policy (Han, 2017). Proponents of the 'political divide' thesis argue that progressives and conservatives are pitched against each other and hold different views on foreign policy matters.…”