Top-Down Democracy in South Korea

by Erik Mobrand, Clark W. Sorensen (Editor)

Overview

While popular movements in South Korea rightly grab the headlines for forcing political change and holding leaders to account, those movements are only part of the story of the construction and practice of democracy. In Top-Down Democracy in South Korea, Erik Mobrand documents another part – the elite-led design and management of electoral and party institutions. Even as the country left authoritarian rule behind, elites have responded to freer and fairer elections by entrenching rather than abandoning exclusionary practices and forms of party organization.

Exploring South Korea’s political development from 1945 through the end of dictatorship in the 1980s and into the twenty-first century, Mobrand challenges the view that the origins of the postauthoritarian political system lie in a series of popular movements that eventually undid repression. He argues that we should think about democratization not as the establishment of an entirely new system, but as the subtle blending of new formal rules with earlier authority structures, political institutions, and legitimizing norms.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780295745480
Publisher:	University of Washington Press
Publication date:	04/19/2019
Series:	Korean Studies of the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	216
File size:	3 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Erik Mobrand is associate professor in the Graduate School of International Studies at Seoul National University.

Table of Contents

Preface ix

Introduction: Participation and Exclusion in a Democracy 3

1 The 1963 System 17

2 De-authoritarianization 46

3 Practicing Top-Down Democracy 68

4 The Participatory Moment 98

5 Backlash 112

6 Rethinking Democratization 132

Conclusion: South Korea's Democracy in Global Perspective 147

Notes 153

Bibliography 173

Index 189

What People are Saying About This

Robert Pekkanen

"Mobrand argues that South Korea’s political parties effectively engage in ‘electoral management’ rather than incorporating popular demands and opening the parties as mass vehicles of representation. He provides a compelling analysis of political parties and democracy in the Republic of Korea and goes further in showing why the South Korean case is so important to our understanding of democracy."

Katharine H. S. Moon

"Top-Down Democracy in South Korea debunks the notion of a bottom-up civil-society activation of transition and an overthrow of old systems of governance."

Editorial Reviews

"[A] sophisticated analysis of the evolution of South Korea’s democracy and its perspectives in the twenty-first century. The author demonstrates a thorough knowledge of the multiple details and nuances of internal Korean politics and a deep understanding of the international context."

European Journal of Korean Studies

"[A] concise, compelling, and original examination."

Journal of American-East Asian Relations

"Mobrand's study not only provides an explanation of why Korea's top-down democracy is the way it is, but also generates questions for future research on authoritarian legacies, democratic consolidation, and varieties of democracy."

Pacific Affairs