Defeatism prevails among members of the ruling Grand National Party. No trace of the gung-ho spirit is found among its members with the Seoul mayoral by-election fast approaching. Few believe they will win the race again this time.
The low morale, resulting from a shift in voter sentiment against the ruling party, was best illustrated by the words of Rep. Chung Doo-un, a leading member of the party, who said: “Word is widespread that the Grand National Party’s sell-by date is over.” This pessimism is shared by President Lee Myung-bak, who commented on what was dubbed the “Ahn Cheol-soo phenomenon,” saying: “What had yet to come has finally come.”
The sudden rise of Prof. Ahn of Seoul National University in popularity, Lee said, reflected the disillusioned electorate’s growing demand for change in the political community. His diagnosis was correct, given that such an apolitical man as Ahn was perceived by the electorate as an ideal figure for the post of Seoul mayor.
By the political community, however, he meant both the ruling and opposition parties, implying that the responsibility must be shared by the rival parties, instead of being dumped on the ruling party alone. Even so, the Grand National Party is held much more responsible than the main opposition Democratic Party, simply because it is the governing party.
But the ruling party as a whole does not seem to be as perceptive of the electorate’s disaffection as President Lee, given a comment it made when Ahn decided to support another apolitical figure, social activist Park Won-soon, instead of running for the mayoral race himself. The party criticized Ahn’s decision as “a Gangnam leftist’s political show.”
Before calling Ahn a Gangnam leftist ― a pejorative term ― the ruling party should have stopped to ponder why Ahn was approved of by many of those who had voted for its conservative candidates in previous elections and what it needed to do to stop the hemorrhaging of support. The trouble with the party is that many of the deserters can be newly classified as Gangnam leftists.
Gangnam leftist, literally a leftist residing in the premium residential district of Gangnam in Seoul, is a term used to illustrate the perceived hypocrisy of a well-to-do and well-educated liberals living not just in Gangnam but anywhere in the nation. An equivalent to the phrase limousine liberal, the term, be it derogatory or not, reflects the widening trend among people in high-income brackets of voting liberal, which political commentators regard as a major change in Korean politics.
The emerging trend was observed in the 2010 elections of ward mayors in the three electoral districts in Gangnam. Though the Grand National Party carried them all, candidates fielded by the Democratic Party won 45 percent of the total vote in Songpa-gu, 40 percent in Seocho-gu and 30 percent in Gangnam-gu. The liberal portion of the vote was even higher when it included ballots cast for candidates representing the Democratic Labor Party. Voting liberal was more pronounced elsewhere, with the opposition party carrying 21 of the 22 remaining wards.
Political commentators attribute the en masse defection of the ruling party’s traditional supporters to worsening economic woes, including uncontrollable prices, unbearably high university tuition fees and snowballing household debt. Their diagnosis may not be far off the mark, given that the economic state of the nation often determines the outcome of an election. It may be worthwhile for the party to remind itself of a phrase widely used during Bill Clinton’s successful 1992 presidential campaign: “It’s the economy, stupid.”
Moreover, the Lee administration is often perceived to have maintained a business-friendly policy at the expense of low-income families, promoted a growth-first policy, resulting in runaway inflation, and served the interests of chaebol when pursuing an economic recovery.
As a first step toward damage control, the ruling party will have to review the policies that it has implemented and those it has failed to do and determine what they have done to its image. Based on this study, it needs to develop a new party platform and make a fresh start for the parliamentary and presidential elections scheduled for next year, if not for the Oct. 26 mayoral by-election.
