Noriyo Isozaki

Abstract This chapter analyzes how South Korea, despite adopting democratic institutions at independence in 1948, quickly transitioned into a personal dictatorship under President Syngman Rhee. After liberation from Japanese colonial rule and three years under US military occupation, a democratic system was introduced, but the process of decolonization empowered charismatic independence activists over institutional actors. Rhee, a long-exiled nationalist leader, used mass mobilization and anti-trusteeship rhetoric to gain popular legitimacy. Although initially constrained by democratic institutions and lacking strong party backing, he manipulated constitutional amendments, suppressed opposition, and exploited Cold War anti-communism to consolidate power. Rhee’s dictatorship—justified through elections and nationalism—was enabled by weak party institutionalization and inherited colonial administrative structures. The regime collapsed in 1960 following widespread protests against election fraud. The chapter argues that South Korea’s first political regime deviated from democratic paths not due to Cold War imposition, but through a homegrown personalist trajectory rooted in the politics of decolonization and weak democratic foundations.

Under what conditions do the congress members revise the election-related law that might influence their own positions? This paper examined such a general question through the comparison between the fundamental change of party organization such as the abolition of local branch in South Korea in 2004 and its failure in 2000. This paper discovered the following points. First, the electoral system to which parliament member is punished easily by the voters must exist. Second, incumbent members agreement to law revision depends on what frame interpreting the social phenomenon is offered to the voters. In our case, what made the incumbent members who persisted in their partisan policy package accept non-partisan policy package was the successful presentation by the election administration committee as an independent actor to the voters of the frame which locates the abolition of local branch in non-partisan policy package. However now, such a model is tested only in the cases where many of voters are low in the party identity, and have distrust in the party like South Korea. This model can be applied also in other cases, but the elaboration of the applicable condition is future tasks.