President Lee’s ‘real-estate’ pump-priming… what has vanished entirely from the media?

As an ordinary citizen, watching South Korea’s recent political situation feels suffocating. There is no dialogue or compromise at all—only blanket condemnation and attacks, without even weighing whether the other side’s arguments are right or wrong.

It is natural for the opposition to criticise the government and work to win the next election. But criticism has a prerequisite: it must be for the benefit of all citizens of the Republic of Korea, and it must keep to proper bounds. Saying “proper bounds” may sound abstract, but overstepping them means invoking “the people” in words while, in reality, pursuing policies or criticism that serve only one’s own support base.

The disappearance of dialogue and compromise stems from a refusal to recognise the other side. President Lee Jae-myung was elected; from the conservative camp’s perspective this may be frustrating and disappointing, but no matter how much one may dislike him, he is nonetheless the president chosen by the people through a democratic election. In other words, he possesses legitimacy and democratic mandate. Because the People Power Party refuses to recognise the president and looks only to its hard-core supporters—continually denying this fact—dialogue with the government has become impossible.

A representative example is party leader Jang Dong-hyuk cancelling a long-awaited meeting with the president just one hour beforehand. He may have heard from his supporters, “Well done, that feels good,” and perhaps felt satisfied by it. But one has to ask what he actually gained. In the author’s view, Jang lost both moral ground and practical benefit and emerged a loser from the episode.

The Democratic Party is even worse. From the outset it branded the People Power Party a “party of insurrection” and refused to meet them at all—so dialogue was never going to happen. In the legislative process it often passes bills unilaterally without even asking for the opposition’s views. An opposition left with no means of restraint is bound to move toward extremes.

Even the weak, when driven into a corner, will resist desperately by any means. At present, the Democratic Party is pushing the People Power Party into an extreme situation. When cornered, actors choose extreme methods rather than dialogue.

Under Jang Dong-hyuk, today’s People Power Party looks like an animal backed into a corner—poisoned with desperation and ready for all-or-nothing moves. Public trust has evaporated and approval ratings are at rock bottom; internal divisions are so severe it hardly resembles a party; and in the National Assembly there is no effective way to resist the Democratic Party.

In such circumstances, the leadership of the People Power Party has very few options. Leaning on hard-core supporters who console and back them, they end up acting according to those supporters’ wishes and tastes.

When humans are cornered and pushed to extremes, their capacity for rational judgement deteriorates.

The so-called “era of the three Kims” keeps coming to mind. Kim Young-sam, Kim Dae-jung and Kim Jong-pil were lifelong political adversaries, yet they respected and acknowledged one another. When politics reached a deadlock, they held summit talks and forged compromises. The public felt reassured by those scenes. In retrospect, it feels like an era of romantic politics.

Dialogue and compromise begin with recognising one another. Without recognition, there are neither meetings nor conversations. One must meet to talk, and talk to compromise. When the president posts a remark on X (formerly Twitter), the opposition looks only for flaws and opposes it outright; the ruling side, in turn, scolds the opposition for nit-picking. With no dialogue, no matter how loudly the opposition shouts its criticism, the government pays no heed—turning it into nothing more than a shout for its own base.

I personally dislike President Lee Jae-myung because he intervenes in too many matters, appears partisan, and makes many unnecessary remarks. But I do acknowledge his administrative competence. Like capable CEOs I once saw in corporate life, he often pinpoints problems precisely and delivers pointed criticism in meetings. That is something rarely seen among career politicians—skills likely honed during his long tenure as mayor of Seongnam and governor of Gyeonggi Province. Acknowledging his competence, however, is separate from agreeing with his policy direction.

The president is Lee Jae-myung, and the party with an overwhelming numerical advantage in the National Assembly is the Democratic Party. It is hard to see what the People Power Party—absolutely the weaker side—gains by refusing meetings and dialogue with the president and the Democratic Party.

At times like this, the People Power Party should be taking the initiative in dialogue. Watching its lawmakers walk out en masse from standing committees as the Democratic Party forces bills through is exasperating. Walking out gains nothing. They should cling on to the end and try to reflect even a single element of their position in legislation. Failing to do what lawmakers are duty-bound to do, and acting solely on partisan calculation, amounts to dereliction of duty. Who sees a walkout as strength? It is seen as cowardice.

Dialogue will begin only when the People Power Party acknowledges that it is the weaker side and the opponent is stronger. Right now, despite being weak, it behaves as if it were the former dominant force—so no solution emerges. Strategies differ for strong and weak actors. The strong rely on overwhelming force; the weak must devise careful strategy. Internal unity is essential, and with resources vastly inferior to the opponent’s, losses must be minimised while seeking maximum effect from minimal investment.

Yet the People Power Party fails to grasp this basic strategy, attempting to use a strong-side approach against a stronger opponent. Under such conditions, failure is inevitable.

Changing the party’s name will not alter its current standing. With the substance unchanged, no citizen will accept that it has transformed. Many, like the author, will think, “What a pathetic display.” With internal division so severe, even party discipline is hard—let alone dialogue and compromise with the ruling camp.

There are five words the author would offer to today’s political class: recognition, meeting, dialogue, inclusion, compromise. Keep them in mind, and the stalemate might ease.

Rather than endless finger-pointing and denunciation, I want to see—even if not frequently—the leaders of the ruling and opposition parties meet, talk through issues, and compromise to steer the country steadily. With local elections approaching, the president keeps bringing real-estate issues to the surface, stirring public emotion. Yet the matter politics should be most focused on is U.S. tariff negotiations.

With the nation and political class consumed by real-estate disputes, the issue of negotiations with the United States has vanished from media coverage. For South Korea, this is several times more important than property politics, yet there is little reporting on how talks are proceeding, and no clear government briefings.

At times like this, the media and the opposition should be highlighting the U.S. tariff negotiations even more—but they are not, leaving citizens frustrated. Perhaps the government is intentionally blocking coverage; whatever the case, moments like this make one think how ineffectual our media truly are.

#KoreanPolitics #DialogueAndCompromise #USKoreaTrade