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Politics
in Korea
Korea's
Government
The
year 1998 marks the fiftieth anniversary of both
the adoption of the Constitution and the
establishment of the Republic of Korea. As
a constitutionally based, democratic government
is still relatively young, debates regarding
major government changes, like the adoption of a
parliamentary system, are still ongoing.
Prior to the establishment of the Republic in
1948, Korea experienced thirty-five year of
Japanese colonial rule (1910-1945) followed by
three years of American military rule
(1945-1948). The Japanese annexation of
Korea in 1910 placed Korea under a foreign rule
for the first time in its history.
Since
its transformation into a republic, the Korean
government, except for a brief period between
August 1960 and July 1961 when a parliamentary
system was in place, has maintained a
presidential system, wherein the President is
the head of state and chief executive.
Under the present system, government power is
shared principally by three branches: the
legislative, judicial and executive. In
addition, two other constitutionally-based
institutions, the Constitutional Court and the
National Election Commission, also perform
governing functions.
The
legislature consists of a single-house National
Assembly, whose 299 members serve four-year
terms. The organizational components of
the National Assembly are: the individual
members, the presiding officers (the Speaker and
two Vice Speakers), the plenary, the committees
(16 standing committees as well as special ad
hoc committees), the negotiation groups, and the
supporting administrative organs. Besides
deliberating bills concerning general
legislation, government budget, and ratification
of international treaties, the National Assembly
is also empowered to inspect and audit the
administration, and to approve the appointments
of the Prime Minister and the Director of the
Board of Inspection and Audit. The
National Assembly may, according to law, impeach
public officials, and may adopt motions
recommending to the President the removal of
executive officials, including the Prime
Minister.
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The
judiciary consists of three tiers of courts: the
Supreme Court; the high courts or appellate
courts; the district courts. Currently,
the judiciary is exclusively a central
government function; no provincial or local
government may establish its own court or
prosecution system. The Supreme Court
consists of thirteen Justices and a Chief
Justice. High courts are placed in five
locations which serve as regional centers.
Besides the three-tier court system, the
judiciary also operates a family court, an
administrative court and a patent court.
The
executive branch, headed by the President,
consists of the Prime Minister, the State
Council, seventeen executive ministries,
seventeen independent agencies, the Board of
Inspection and Audit, and the National
Intelligence Service. The President,
elected by popular vote for a single five-year
term, has absolute power needed for operating
the executive branch and leading the country.
The Prime Minister, appointed by the President
with the approval of the National Assembly,
supervises the ministries and independent
agencies. The Prime Minister performs this
function under the supervision of the President,
and in this sense he/she is the chief assistant
to the President.
Local
governments are considered part of the executive
branch and thus are controlled by the central
government. (Here "local
governments" refers broadly to all
sub-national governments.) However, some
degree of local autonomy has been given to the
16 higher-level (provincial) governments and 34
lower level (municipal) governments. This
autonomy resumed, after a time lapse of more
than thirty years, on July 1, 1995 - a date
marking a return to direct, popular elections
for local chief executives. Prior to this,
local governments had been simply local branches
of the central government, with the latter
appointing and dispatching the chiefs.
Despite the change, the autonomous power of
local governments at this point remains quite
limited. Virtually all major policies,
including those specifying local government
functions, taxation, resident welfare and
services, and personnel management, are
determined by the central government.
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Information
provided by the Korean Embassy
Korea's
Constitution
The
Constitution of the Republic of Korea was first
promulgated on July 17, 1948. Since then,
it has been amended nine times, with the October
27, 1987 amendment being the last one. The
focus of the amendments has generally been on
the President's powers and method of election,
and to a lesser extent, the structure of the
legislature.
Under
the original constitution, the President was
elected by the single-house National Assembly.
The first amendment, made in 1952, provided for
direct election of the President by popular
vote, in addition to provided for a bicameral
legislature. The second amendment, adopted
in 1954, includes a provision for the Vice
President to succeed the President in case of
his/her death or incapacitation. In July
1960, the Constitution was amended a third time
by the interim government which followed the
overthrow of authoritarian President Syngman
Rhee (this overthrow having been occasion by a
popular uprising led by students and supported
by the military). This third amendment
marked the adoption of a parliamentary system,
wherein the Prime Minister served as chief
executive, while a popularly elected President
served as the head of state and commander of
armed forces. The fourth amendment, in
November 1960, added a special provision to the
Constitution which enabled the National Assembly
to enact retroactive laws aimed at punishing
those directly involved in election fraud, or
punishing those responsible for the the killing
or wounding of people protesting such frauds.
Others liable for punishment included those
engaged in anti-democratic activities as well as
those public officials who, while serving the
previous government, were later convicted of
corruption.
The
fifth amendment (which corresponds to the first
rewriting of the Constitution) was made in 1962
by the military government which followed the
military coup-d-etat of 1961. This
amendment put the presidential system and the
single-house legislature back in place.
The sixth amendment, written in 1969, included a
provision to relax restrictions on the number of
consecutive terms a president could serve.
The limit was raised from two terms to three,
thus enabling President Park Chung Hee to seek a
third consecutive term. The seventh
amendment in 1972 (the second rewriting) went
still further, effectively allowing President
Park Chung Hee to rule for life. This was
accomplished by, on one hand, eliminating
restrictions on the number of terms the
President could serve, and on the other hand,
devising indirect elections of the President
through a newly created electoral college.
Under this Constitution, the President was truly
all-powerful, with the authority to fill
one-third of the seats in the National Assembly,
to dissolve the National Assembly, and to issue
emergency decrees that could be easily used as
means to oppress opposition groups or
individuals.
The
eighth amendment (the third rewriting) was made
in October 1980 by the military government of
Chun Doo Hwan, who took power following the
assassination of President Park Chung Hee in
October 1979. The amendment provided
for a single seven-year term for the President,
while maintaining the system of indirect
elections through an electoral college (thus
shielding Chun Doo Hwan from the risk of defeat
in a popular election). The ninth and last
amendment (the fourth rewriting) was made in
1987. It restored popular elections for
the President, who was henceforth restricted to
a single five-year term.
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The
Constitution provides for a three-branch
governing system whereby law-making functions
are in the preserve of the National Assembly,
administrative functions are in the preserve of
the executive branch, headed by the President,
and judicial functions belong to the courts.
Structurally, these three branches are highly
independent of each other. The members of
the national Assembly are elected by the people,
and the National Assembly's leaders and officers
are chosen by the members themselves. As
for the President, he/she is not required to
obtain the approval of the national Assembly in
appointing top executive officials, except
in the case of the Prime Minister and the
Director of the Board of Inspection and Audit.
The head of the Supreme Court, the Chief
Justice, although appointed by the President
with the consent of the national Assembly,
possesses the power to recommend to the
President the appointment of Supreme Court
Justices, and has the power to appoint all other
judges.
It
is not the Supreme Court but the Constitutional
Court that has the authority to render judgments
regarding the constitutionality of laws,
impeachment cases, and the dissolution of
political parties. The Constitutional
Court also adjudicates jurisdictional disputes
between government agencies, between national
and local governments, and between different
local governments.
The
Constitution supports a free-market economy.
It declares that the nation's economic order is
based on recognizing individual and corporate
freedom and creativity. It provides that
the right to acquire, develop and use natural
resources and to grant them exclusively to
particular agent(s) for a period of time
specified by law. it also recognizes State
obligations to ensure cultivation by
land-owners, and to support efficient and
balanced development regarding land use.
Proposals
to amend the Constitution may be initiated by
either the President or a majority of the
National Assembly. The National Assembly
should decide on the proposed amendments within
sixty days of their public announcement.
Passage of an amendment requires at least a
two-thirds majority of the entire membership of
the National Assembly, and requires assent by a
majority of the votes cast (with the additional
requirement that at least one-half of eligible
voters participate). One interesting, but
serious provision concerning constitution
amendments is that "an amendment made to
extend the term(s) of the President , or to
alter the number of the terms the President may
serve, is ineffective for the President who
holds the post when the amendment was
proposed." This provision reflects
past experience with Presidents who, as
discussed above, attempted to prolong their rule
through constitutional revision.
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Information
provided by the Korean Embassy
The
Judiciary System in
Korea
The
Constitutional Court
Activities
The
Constitutional Court safeguards the Constitution
by annulling any unconstitutional law passed by
the National Assembly. This is done through a
judgement passed by the Constitutional Court
upon request of a lower court, or upon request
of a party who has filed a Constitutional
Complaint whose request for referral was
rejected by the lower courts.
The
Constitutional Court also validates the legality
of impeachment proceedings and judgements of any
high-ranking public official, including the
President, Prime Minister or a judge, and
declares these proceedings legal and binding.
Furthermore, the Court may order the dissolution
of a political party, upon the request of the
Executive, if enough evidence exists to suggest
that the party in question has engaged in
illegal activities. This authority is assigned
to the Constitutional Court with the aim of
protecting the Constitution.
The
Constitutional Court also safeguards the
Constitution by protecting people's fundamental
rights. Anyone whose fundamental rights, which
are guaranteed by the Constitution, have been
infringed upon, by the exercise or omission of
the Executive power, may file a petition, for
relief or remedy, to the Constitutional Court.
Anyone whose consitutional rights have allegedly
been aggrieved by a legislative act itself may
also resort to the Court by means of a
Constitutional Complaint. Furthermore, any party
to a civil, criminal, or administrative case,
whose motion to have the case referred to the
Constitutional Court was rejected by the
ordinary court, may file a complaint directly to
the Constitutional Court, in order to seek a
final judgement. The adoption of the
Constitutional Complaint is the most distinctive
features of the current constitutional judgement
system. By giving the people direct access to
the Constitutional Court by means of filing a
Constitutional Complaint, this system guarantees
civil rights not only in theory but in practice.
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Organizations
The
Constitutional Court consists of nine justices
who are forty or more years of age and who have
had legal careers for fifteen or more years. All
justices are appointed by the President of the
Republic of Korea. However, the pool of
candidates from which the President can choose
Constitutional Court justices is selected by
both the Judiciary and the National Assembly.
The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court nominates
a number of candidates from which the President
must choose three. The rest are chosen out of a
pool of candidates nominated by the National
Assembly. In this way, all justices that make up
the Constitutional Court are selected by the
Legislative, the Executive, and the Judiciary.
The president
of the Constitutional Court is appointed by the
President of the Republic among the justices,
with the consent of the National Assembly.
Justices make their judgements independently,
guided only by the Constitution and their
conscience. No justice shall be discharged from
office against his or her will unless he or she
is impeached or is sentenced to prison. No
justice can join a political party or otherwise
participate in political activities.
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The
Judiciary
Judicial power
is vested in the courts, constitutionally an
independent branch of the Government. The court
system functions on three levels: the Supreme
Court, appellate courts, district courts
(including branch courts). Besides the
three-tier court system; the judiciary also
operates a family court, an administrative court
and a patent court. The courts judge civil,
criminal, administrative, election, and other
judicial litigations, and manage and supervise
affairs concerning the registration of real
estate, census register, deposits, and judicial
scriveners.
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Organizations
Supreme
Court
The Supreme
Court is the highest judicial tribunal of the
nation. It is located in Seoul and consists of a
Chief Justice and thirteen Justices. In the
Supreme Court, cases are presided over by either
the Grand Bench composed of the justices sitting
en banc (the entire membership of the
court participates in the decision) or the Petty
Benches, each of which is usually composed of
four justices.
The Supreme
Court deals with appeals against judgments or
decisions rendered by the high courts and the
appellate divisions of the district courts. The
Supreme Court also has exclusive jurisdiction
over the validity of a presidential and/or
general elections. It is empowered to make a
final review of the legality of administrative
decrees, regulations or dispositions.
The Supreme
Court may establish rules regarding internal
regulations, administration of the court, and
trial procedures.
The grounds
for appeal to the Supreme Court are prescribed.
In civil cases, they are limited to
constitutional and legal questions pertaining to
the judgments of lower courts. In criminal
lawsuits, an appeal may be brought in case of a
violation of the constitution or the law, the
abolition, alteration or excuse of a penalty; a
grave error in fact-finding; or extreme
impropriety in the sentencing.
To assist the
justices in hearing the enormous number of
cases, research judges are appointed from among
the judges of the high courts. At present, two
research judges are assigned to each justice
exclusively. There is also a pool of research
judges consisting of 20 to 30 judges.
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Appellate
Court
An appellate
court consists of a presiding judge and usually
three associate judges. It hears appeals against
verdicts of district or family courts in civil
or criminal cases, administrative cases, or
special cases designated by law. There are five
appellate courts in the country - Seoul, Taegu,
Pusan, Kwangju, and TaejCon.
They hold their own trials and reach decisions
for or against the verdicts of the lower courts.
Only appellate courts can dispense justice on
all administrative litigations filed by
individuals or organizations against any
government decision, order, or disposition.
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District
Court
District
courts which have primary jurisdiction over most
cases are set up in Seoul and 12 other major
cities, most of which are provincial capitals.
The District Court of Seoul is divided into two
separate courts; the Seoul Civil District Court
and the Seoul Criminal District Court. District
court trials usually are conducted by a single
judge, but a three-judge panel is mandatory in
such serious cases as civil cases in which the
value in question exceeds 50 million Won
(equivalent to about US$ 37,000), and criminal
cases in which the defendant can be sentenced to
death, penal servitude or imprisonment of more
than one year. A district court can be assisted
by one or more branch courts with single judges
for the purpose of dealing with a part of
district court business.
As of June 1,
1998, there were 42 branch courts and 105
municipal courts. Their purpose is to manage and
deal with the affairs of the district courts.
Municipal courts, which were created to maximize
judicial services to local people, have replaced
circuit courts. Municipal court judges preside
over small claims, minor offenses and divorce by
mutual agreement.
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Family
Court
The Family
Court is empowered to hear all cases involving
matrimonial, juvenile, or other domestic
matters. Court sessions are closed to the public
to insure the privacy of the individuals
concerned. At present, the Family Court is
located only in Seoul. In other places, the
appropriate district court handles such matters.
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Administrative
Court
The
Administrative Court, opened in Seoul on March
1, 1998, hears administrative cases only.
District courts outside of Seoul perform the
functions of the Administrative Court in their
respective district.
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Patent
Court
The Patent
Court, opened in TaejCon
on March 1, 1998, reviews decisions made by the
Patent Office as an intermediate appellate
jurisdiction. The Supreme Court plays a role as
the final tribunal of patent disputes. The
ordinary district courts, however, still hear
infringement cases.
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Courts-martial
The
courts-martial are military courts which
exercise jurisdiction over offenses committed by
members of the Armed Forces and their civilian
employees. These offenses include treason,
disobedience, desertion, or other crimes as
defined in the Military Penal Law. Civilians can
come under the jurisdiction of a court-martial
if implicated in cases of military espionage,
interference with the execution of military
duties, or certain other specified offenses.
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Qualification
and Appointment
The Chief
Justice and justices of the Supreme Court must
be 40 years old or over, with more than 15 years
of experience as judges, prosecutors or lawyers.
Judges other than those of the Supreme Court
must pass the Judicial Civil Service Examination
and complete the two-year training program at
the Judicial Research and Training Institute, as
well as serve another two-year as a
"probationary judge," or must be a
duly qualified prosecutor or lawyer. The Chief
Justice of the Supreme Court is appointed by the
President with the consent of the National
Assembly. Other justices are appointed by the
President upon the recommendation of the Chief
Justice. The judges of the lower courts are
appointed by the Chief Justice. The term of
office of the Chief Justice is six years and
he/she cannot be reappointed. Chief Justice must
retire from office at the age of 70. The term
for other justices is six years and they must be
reappointed in accordance with the provisions of
law, but must retire from office when they reach
the age of 65. All other judges must retire at
the age of 63.
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Guarantee
of Status
To insure the
independence of the Judiciary, the tenure of
judges is constitutionally guaranteed. No judge
may be dismissed except by impeachment or
criminal proceedings. Likewise, no judge can be
suspended from office or have his/her salary
reduced except through disciplinary action taken
by the Judicial Disciplinary Committee.
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Judicial
Administration
The Supreme
Court is vested with the responsibility of
judicial administration. The Chief Justice is in
charge of all the court administrative works and
he/she may submit a written opinion letter to
the National Assembly when he/she deems it
necessary to enact or amend laws relating to
court affairs. There are several administrative
entities, which are as following:
The Supreme
Court Justices Council consists of all 14
justices and is presided over the Chief Justice.
The council discusses the appointment of lower
court judges, the formulation of Supreme Court
rules and regulations, requests for budget
amendments or provisions, and other important
matter.
The Ministry
of Court Administration is an instrument
established by the Supreme Court which handles
the general administrative works of the court.
The Chief Justice appoints the Minister from
among the Justices. The ministry consists of
three Offices (Planning, Judicial Policy
Research, Personnel), four bureaus (Litigation,
Property and Family Registry, Court
Construction, General Affairs) and a Public
Relations Office.
The Judicial
Research and Training Institute is the only
uniform educational institution for the bench
and the bar in Korea. It provides a theoretical
as well as practical education to legal
apprentices who have passed the Judicial Civil
Service Examination. The two year program at the
institute is required for admission into the
legal profession. The institute also provides
judges with the opportunity for advanced
continuing education and assists their research
on legal matters.
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Supreme
Public Prosecutor's Office
Under the
control of the Ministry of Justice, there is a
system of public prosecutor's offices. The
prosecutors are empowered to conduct
investigations into violations of law and to
institute legal actions against suspected
law-breakers, directing and supervising the
judicial police under their control. As
protectors of the public interest, they attend
and address court hearings to insure due
application of the law and decrees.
The State's
highest prosecuting agency is the Supreme Public
Prosecutor's Office headed by the Prosecutor
General. It supervises and controls all
subordinate offices: the high prosecutor's
offices, district prosecutor's offices, and
branch prosecutor's offices. The high and
district prosecutor's offices are located in
cities where their judicial counterparts sit.
All these offices, including the Supreme Public
Prosecutor's Office, are under the direction of
the Minister of Justice. He/she is not, however,
authorized to assume control over a prosecutor's
disposition of justice, except when authorized
by pertinent laws.
The Prosecutor
General is appointed by the President among
experienced prosecutors, judges, or lawyers who
have practiced law for more than 15 years. Other
prosecutors are appointed by the Minister of
Justice.
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Information
provided by the Korean Embassy
Political
Parties and the National Election Commission
in Korea
Political
Parties
The
National Election Commission
Historically
political parties were born and developed in
conjunction with the democratization and
diversification of society. They are an
essential ingredient of the modern democratic
political system. Performances of political
parties in a given country is an important
yardstick of measuring the vitality of a
democracy. The Constitution of the Republic of
Korea, in Article 8, defines the important role
and function political parties play in the
Republic: "Political parties may be
organized freely and multiple parties shall be
allowed. The objectives, organization and
activities of a political party shall be
democratic. Political parties shall have an
organization conducive to participating in the
process of forming the people's political
opinions."
The
Constitution also declares that "political
parties shall be protected by the government
according to the provisions of relevant
laws." The most important law enacted by
the Constitutional mandate is the Political
Party Law. Directly quoting the definition of a
political party from the Constitution, the law
states that by virtue of being protected in its
activities and organizational process, the
political parties shall contribute to the
development of sound democratic politics. This
provision stresses freedom of political
activities.
The law
further says that a political party is an entity
organized by the spontaneous action of the
people with a purpose to allow people's
political opinions to be expressed. According to
the law, the political parties may achieve their
objectives by presenting responsible opinions
and policies and by supporting certain
candidates in public elections for the benefit
of the people. Thus, a political party is a
private organization that deals with matters of
public interest. The law also elaborates on the
rules for establishing and maintaining the
political parties and requirements for
democratic organization and operation. As of
August 1998, there were 10 political parties
active in Korea. Only four of them had seats in
the National Assembly-the Grand National Party
(GNP), the National Congress for New Politics (NCNP),
the United Liberal Democrats (ULD), and the New
Party by the People (NPP).
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Activities
of Political Parties
Modern
political parties based on democratic principles
were first introduced to Korea only after it was
liberated from the Japanese colonial government
in 1945. Initially, the political parties were
nothing but groups of small number of relatives,
acquaintances, schoolmates and townsfolk. The
Liberal Party, founded in 1951, was the first to
establish a nationwide organization. The
Democratic Party, the Democratic Republican
Party (DRP) and the New Democratic Party (NDP)
appeared later, and like the Liberal Party, it
also organized local branches around the
country.
Korean
political parties opposing the government
parties were subject to constant persecution by
successive military governments which first came
into power during the coup d'etat of 1961, led
by General Park Chung Hee. For this reason,
party politics existed only in name. Typical of
the government's abuse was the dissolution of
political parties by Park Chung Hee in 1961 and
the banning of political activities imposed on
party members by the Gen. Chun Doo Hwan
Administration in 1980.
Korean
political parties have largely been organized
around a particular leader instead of a party
platform or policies. Since each party is
operating around a political boss, political
parties were not able to represent all sectors
of the society despite their claims to the
contrary.
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The 1987
Constitutional amendment was a milestone in the
history of Korean democracy in that it
reinstated the principle of direct, popular
election of the President for the first time in
20 years. Inspired by the long-sought
Constitutional amendment, many politically
minded people created political parties under a
truly democratic system. Buoyed by the
democratic process of the 1987 election, people
seemed to believe that democracy was here to
stay.
In October
1987, Roh Tae Woo of the Democratic Justice
Party (DJP) was elected President by gathering
36.6 percent of the votes. His election was
attributed to the fact that the opposition camp
failed to put up a single candidate in a unified
fashion. Other candidates in the election were
Kim Young Sam of the Unified Democratic Party (UDP),
Kim Dae-jung of the Democratic Party for Peace,
Kim Jong-pil of the New Democratic Republican
Party (NDRP), and others from splinter parties.
The Korean people who had just recovered their
political freedom foresaw the possibility of a
genuine change of governmental power looming in
the not-too-distant future.
In the
13th-term National Assembly elections that were
held in April 1988, the ruling DJP managed to
win only 125 of the 299 seats. The remaining 71
went to the opposition Democratic Party for
Peace, 60 to the UDP, 35 to the NDRP, and eight
to independents. For the first time in the
history of the Republic, a government party
failed to obtain a majority of seats in the
Legislature.
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Because of the
minority status in the National Assembly, the
government had a hard time in pushing its
agenda. But the government's difficulties did
not last long as the governing DJP merged with
the opposition parties UDP and NDRP in January
1990. The giant coalition, comprising two-thirds
of the total membership, called itself the
Democratic Liberal Party (DLP). Some UDP
lawmakers protested the merger and formed the
Democratic Party (DP).
In 1991,
politicians were moving fast in preparation of
the 14th-term National Assembly elections
scheduled for January the next year. Faced with
the prospect of a showdown with the ruling
coalition, the opposition New Democratic
Alliance Party headed by Kim Dae-jung merged
with the Democratic Party led by Lee Ki-taek.
They actively sought the support of various
civic groups.
However, the
opposition was dealt a devastating defeat by the
ruling coalition in the local autonomy-unit
elections held in March and June 1995. This was
the first time such local elections were held
since 1961 when they were abolished by Park
Chung Hee.
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In early 1992,
Chung Ju-yung, founder of the Hyundai
conglomerate and his allies, created the Unified
People's Party (UPP), a middle-of-the-road
reform party. The UPP lost in the December
presidential election, but won 31 seats in the
National Assembly election in March of the same
year, a decent performance for a party only a
few months old. In the 14th-term parliamentary
elections, the ruling coalition of DLP ended up
winning one seat short from a simple majority.
This was a substantial setback for the
government party which had boasted a two-thirds
majority. The major opposition Democratic Party
won in 97 districts. In the December election,
Kim Young Sam was elected President by winning
42 percent of the votes.
In May 1995,
the United Liberal Democrats (ULD) was organized
by Kim Jong-pil who had broken away from the DLP.
In the local autonomy elections in June of the
same year, the ruling DLP suffered a major
defeat. Of the 15 provincial and metropolitan
gubernatorial elections, the government party
wound up winning only five seats. The opposition
took eight and the remaining two went to
independents. In the shi, gun and gu district
elections held in 230 electoral districts, the
government party won only 70 seats, compared
with the opposition's 107 seats. Independent
candidates took 53 seats. In this election, each
of the major parties won in only certain
regions, deepening worries about provincialism.
In the
15th-term National Assembly elections of 1996,
the NCNP's hopes were shattered when it ended up
getting only 79 of the 299 seats. The NCNP had
hoped to win a majority based on the excellent
performance of the opposition camp in the local
elections held just months before, even though
it had to break away from the Democratic Party
prior to the elections. The ruling New Korea
Party (NKP) won 139 seats, the ULD took 50, the
Democrats got 15, and the remaining 16 seats
went to independents. What worried the
opposition camp particularly was that they
failed to take a majority of the Seoul and KyConggi-do
seats for the first time in the history of
parliamentary elections. The ruling NKP took 54
of the 95 Seoul and KyConggi-do
seats.
The NCNP was
concerned about the results of the election
because it had mobilized all its resources to
win in the central metropolitan region in
preparation for the 1997 presidential election.
As for the
ideological variance for Korean political
parties, few were progressive or socialist in
ideological orientation. The Progressive Party
of the 1950s was probably the only one that
advocated radical social change based on
socialist ideas about class struggle. It was
subsequently repressed by the government in
power. With the expansion of political freedoms
during the 1980's, the People's Party and the
Party of the People was established in 1988 and
1990, respectively, but folded soon thereafter
due to the lack of support from the general
public. In November 1997, the Constructive
People's Victory 21 was created, but fizzled out
after dismal performances in the 1997
presidential and 1998 local elections.
The year 1997
saw another milestone in the Korean party
politics as there was a genuine transfer of
power between a ruling and an opposition party
for the first time in the 50 year existence of
the Republic. In the national election, Kim
Dae-jung of the opposition NCNP was elected
President by winning 40.3 percent of the votes,
1.6 percent over the ruling GNP's Lee Hoe-chang.
President Kim was inaugurated on February 25,
1998.
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Political
Party Finance
Organizing and
financing a political party requires a great
deal of money. To help secure the "Cost of
Democracy," the Law Governing Political
Funds stipulates that a political party may
collect money by means of membership fees,
support committee contributions and other
subsidies.
At the end of
the 1997, the GNP held the majority of National
Assembly seats, with 4,198,699 party members.
The governing coalition of NCNP and ULD had
845,276 and 1,601,727 members, respectively. The
New Party by the People had 108,573 members. All
the parties collect membership dues as well as
contributions from corporations, associations
and individuals. But those amounts fall far
short of meeting their overall financial needs.
The huge gaps
in the financial structure forced many political
parties and big businesses to make illegal deals
that ultimately corrupt politics and jeopardize
the economy of the whole nation. This vicious
cycle of political-business collusion has been a
major problem in Korea.
In order to
rectify the problem, Article 8 of the
Constitution states that "the State may
offer subsidies necessary for the operation of
political parties in accordance with the
provisions of the relevant laws." The
subsidies are only given to the parties which
meet certain legal requirements.
The amount of
subsidies are calculated by multiplying 800 Won
by the number of votes the political parties
received in the most recent national election.
The subsidies add up after each presidential,
National Assembly and local elections.
There are two
types of subsidies-basic and proportional. The
basic subsidies are 50 percent of the total
amount, and they are offered to those parties
with a negotiation group of 20 or more members
in the National Assembly. Those parties with
5-19 members get five percent of the total
amount each. Those parties that have less than
five Assembly seats, but have received a certain
rate of votes in the nationwide local autonomy
unit elections, may get two percent of the total
amount.
The remainder
of the subsidies go to the parties with
parliamentary seats proportionate to the number
of their seats. The balance, if any, goes to the
parties proportionate to the number of votes
each has received in the most recent Assembly
elections.
Political
parties and lawmakers may have a "support
committee" that are able to monetary
contributions. To operate the support committee,
the legislator, the party central committee,
provincial, city, or local election districts
must register with the National Election
Commission.
Individuals
and corporations can join these support
committees on their own free will, and
contribute their own money or the money
collected from non-committee members to the
parties and candidates of their choice. There is
a upper limit to the amount of contribution a
support committee can receive a year. In a
non-election year, the party central committee
can collect a maximum of 20 billion Won, a
metropolitan city or provincial committee can
take 2 billion Won, and the electoral district,
or a National Assembly candidate, can receive up
to 300 million Won per year. During a
presidential year or other election year, most
support committees may receive up to twice the
amount of a non-election year's maximum.
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Organization
The National
Election Commission (NEC) is an independent
council established for fair management of
elections and national referenda as well as
political party-related affairs. It is a
four-level setup composed of 17 central,
provincial and metropolitan city offices, 302
city wards or gu, shi and gun offices,
and 16,161 voting stations. The term of the
commissioner is six years; the commissioner must
not join a political party nor participate in
political activities. He or she must not be
dismissed from the position unless he/she is
impeached, or sentenced to prison, or has been
subject to other more serious punishments by a
court of law.
The commission
may conduct its meetings with half or more of
its members enrolled and make decisions with the
consent of half or more of the members present.
The president of the Commission has the right to
vote, and has the right to break a tie vote.
The commission
is composed of nine members; three of them are
appointed by the President of the Republic,
three by the National Assembly, and the
remaining three, by the Chief Justice. The
members elect a chairperson and one standing
member. It is customary for the members to elect
a Justice of the Supreme Court as a chairman of
the commission.
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Duties
The commission
manages national and local elections mandated by
the Constitution and the Election Rigging
Prevention Law as well as other elections
entrusted by public entities. They include the
following:
- Presidential
elections
- National
Assembly elections
- Elections of
local autonomous district heads (such as
metropolitan city mayors, province governors, shi
mayors, gu commissioners and gun commissioners.)
- Elections of
local autonomous district councils (such as
councils of metropolitan cities, provinces, shis,
gus and guns.)
- Elections
entrusted by public entities.
- Researches
on election systems
The commission
manages referenda regarding constitutional
revision and other important initiatives on
international relations, defense, national
reunification and other national security
issues.
The commission
also manages matters regarding the establishment
of political parties and their activities, as
well as the management of public political
funds.
The commission
conducts public relations campaign all year
round, to firmly establish a tradition of fair
elections. In addition to managing
constitutionally mandated affairs, the
commission holds public events and visits
various organizations and schools to give
speeches on the importance of elections. It also
educates new voters and supports fair election
activities sponsored by social and religious
groups.
To ensure
truly fair elections, the commission focuses its
effort not only on the enforcement of fair
voting and ballot counting, but also on making
sure that election campaigns are carried out
lawfully. The commission actively seeks to
prevent illegal campaign practices by political
parties and candidates. If illegality is
suspected, it takes due and prompt investigatory
action.
The Election
Management Institute of the commission regularly
trains its employees at all levels, including
civil servants and other elections management
and political party workers, on the subject of
election procedures, political parties as well
as the management and distribution of political
funds.
The commission
initiates legislation and revision of laws
concerning elections, referenda and political
parties through the National Assembly when it
deems necessary.
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Information
provided by the Korean Embassy
Korean
Ministries
Currently
there are seventeen executive ministries, the
heads of which are designated as members of the
State Council. These ministries are
responsible for the formulation and
implementation of government policies in their
respective policy areas. Ministers are
appointed by the President with the
recommendation of the Prime Minister. They
have the right to lead and supervise the
executive ministries under their management, to
deliberate major state affairs, to act on behalf
of the President and appear in the National
Assembly, and to issue Ministry orders as
delegated by Presidential orders.
Ministers are collectively and individually
responsible to the President.
Besides
the executive ministries, there are seventeen
functionally independent agencies and
administrations whose scope of activities is
relatively narrow and specific. Each
agency/administration is typically headed by
Vice-ministerial level administrators (three of
them are headed by Assistant-minister level
officials) appointed by the President with the
recommendation of the Prime Minister. They
are allied with specific ministries as well as
the Prime Minister, and function under the
supervision of the affiliated ministers.
The seventeen agencies/administrations are: the
Office of National Budget, the National Tax
Administration, the Korea Customs Office, the
National Statistical Office, the Supreme Public
Prosecutor's Office, the Military Manpower
Administration, the National Police Agency, the
Korea Meteorological Administration, the Office
of Cultural Properties, the Rural Development
Administration, the Forestry Administration, the
Small and Medium Business Administration, the
Korean Industrial Property Office, the Korea
Food and Drug Administration, the National
Railroad Administration, the Supply
Administration, and the National Maritime Police
Agency.
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Ministry
of Finance and Economy
The Ministry
of Finance and Economy is in charge of policies
concerning the formation and execution of
government budgets, mobilization of resources,
investment, technical development, and economic
cooperation with foreign countries and
international organizations. This ministry is
also responsible for the central government's
financial affairs, including financial bills,
currency, national bonds, accounts, taxation,
customs, foreign exchange, and control of
state-owned and vested properties. The Minister
of Finance and Economy is responsible for
coordinating all transactions between ministries
related to economy and finance.
The Ministry
undertakes these responsibilities through its
Office of Tax and Customs (under which are three
bureau-level officers: Internal Revenue and Tax
Affairs; Property, Consumption and International
Tax Affairs; and Customs and Tariffs) as well as
through the Bureaus of Economic Policy,
Treasury, Financial Policy, International
Finance, Economic Cooperation, and Welfare and
Price Policy. The Ministry's jurisdiction
extends over the National Tax College and
National Tax Tribunal. Finally, the Ministry
controls and supervises five independent
agencies: Office of National Budget, National
Tax Administration, Korea Customs Office, and
National Statistical Office.
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Ministry
of Unification
The Ministry
of Unification undertakes policy planning,
information analysis, public education and
public information on issues concerning national
unification. These responsibilities are carried
out by the Unification Policy Office, the
Information Analysis Office, the Inter-Korean
Interchange and Cooperation Bureau, and the
Humanitarian Affairs Bureau. It also runs the
Institute of Political Education for National
Unification, the Office of South-North Dialogue,
and the Secretariat Office of Advisory Council
on Democratic and Peaceful Unification.
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Ministry
of Foreign Affairs and Trade
The Ministry
of Foreign Affairs and Trade has jurisdiction
over all matters concerning diplomacy, trade and
treaties with foreign countries. It formulates
and implements diplomatic policies; formulates,
implements, integrates and coordinates
diplomatic policies related to trade, trade
talks and international economy; provides
overseas information; conducts surveys of
international environs; and handles matters
concerning treaties and other international
agreements, cultural cooperation, immigration,
and protection and assistance to Korean
nationals abroad. The Ministry is responsible
for Korean missions to other countries which are
headed by ambassadors, consul-generals or
consuls, and maintains relations with the
diplomatic and consular representatives of
foreign nations in Korea. The Ministry is also
responsible for matters concerning economic and
financial relations with other countries.
The Ministry
carries out these functions through the Office
of Policy Planning; and the Bureaus of Asian and
Pacific Affairs, North American Affairs, Latin
American and Caribbean Affairs, European
Affairs, Middle East and African Affairs,
Treaties, International Economic Affairs,
Cultural Cooperation, and Overseas Residents and
Consular Affairs; and three trade-related
bureaus (Trade Promotion, Bilateral Trade,
Multilateral Trade) which are supervised by the
recently established Office of Minister of State
for Trade. The Minister of State for Trade
serves as the trade representative under the
Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The
Ministry also controls and supervises the
Institute of Foreign Affairs and National
Security, the Korea International Coopera-tion
Agency, the Korea Foundation, and the Overseas
Koreans Foundation.
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Ministry
of Justice
The Ministry
of Justice is responsible for the prosecution,
probation and security observation, penal
administration, protection of juveniles,
rehabilitation, control of crossborder
exit/entry, protection of human rights,
naturalization, notary, and other legal affairs
of government. It is further responsible for the
prison system, immigration, and the supervision
of prosecutors. All criminal justice and prison
systems are national functions.
The policies
and programs of Justice Ministry are carried out
through the Office of Legal Affairs, the
Prosecution Bureau, the Immigration Bureau, the
Correction Bureau, and the Social Protection
& Rehabilitation Bureau. The Ministry
controls and supervises the Supreme Public
Prosecutor's Office.
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Ministry
of National Defense
The Ministry
of National Defense (MND) deals with policies,
rules and orders related to national defense,
and all other military affairs. The Armed Forces
- Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps, and
Reserve Forces - are placed under the control of
this ministry.
The MND
undertakes its functions through Deputy
Ministers for Policy, Human Resources, and
Aquisition and Technology. These have 17 offices
and bureaus as sub-institutions. They are: the
Troop Information and Public Affairs Office, the
Legal Affairs Management Offices, the Inspector
General, the Office of Organization and Manpower
Management, the Health and Environment Offiice,
the Arms Control Office, the Planning and
Coordination Office, the Force Improvement
Programming Office, the Project Coordination
Office, the Aquisition and Development Office,
the Policy and Planning Bureau, the Personnel
and Welfare Bureau, the Mobilization Bureau, the
Budget and Finance Bureau, the Logistics Bureau,
the Installations Bureau, and the Information
Systems Bureau.
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Ministry
of Government Administration and Home Affairs
The Ministry
of Government Administ-ration and Home Affairs
(which represents the merging of two differnt
organization, the Ministry of Government
Administration and the Ministry of Home Affairs)
undertakes virtually all service and management
functions related to the operation of central
and local governments.
Its
responsibilities are carried out through the
Bureaus of Protocol and State Council,
Personnel, Administrative Management, Local
Autonomy Support, Local Finance and Economy, and
Local Tax. Under the Headquarters of Civil
Defense and Disaster Management are three
additional bureaus: Civil Defense and Disaster
Management, Disaster Prevention and
Preparedness, and Fire Administration.
The Ministry
has under its jurisdiction an array of
institutions, including the Central Officials
Training Institute, the Appeals Commission, the
Government Buildings Supply and Management
Service, the Government Archives and Records
Service, the Government Computer Center, the
Local Administration Training Institute, the
National Institute for Disaster Prevention, the
National Fire Service Academy, the National
Institute of Scientific Investigation, National
119 Rescue Services, and Five Provinces of
Northern Korea. The National Police Agency is
also under the direction and supervision of this
ministry.
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Ministry
of Education
The Ministry
of Education is responsible for issues and
concerns pertaining to both formal and
non-formal education. The Ministry consists of
two offices, the Office of Planning and
Management, and the School Policy Offices, and
four bureaus, the Life-long Education Bureau,
the Academic Research Policy Bureau, the
Education Environment Improvement Bureau and the
Cyber Education Bureau. These bureaus, in
working in coordination with one another,
fulfill their various duties and wide-ranging
tasks.
The Ministry
also oversees the National History Compilation
Committee, the National Institute for
International Education Development, the
National Institute for Training of Educational
Administrators, the Appeal Commission for
Teachers, the Korean Institute for Special
Education, and the National Academy of Sciences.
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Ministry
of Science and Technology
The Ministry
of Science and Technolo-gy is responsible for
overseeing national S & T policy,
administering affairs related to S & T
policy-making, and coordinating national R &
D programs. It carries out these tasks through
the Planning & Management Office, the R
& D Policy Office, and Atomic Energy Office,
the S & T Policy Bureau, the Basic Science
& Manpower Bureau, and the S & T
Cooperation Bureau. This ministry also operates
the National Science Museum and supervises the
Meteorological Administration.
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Ministry
of Culture and Tourism
The Ministry
of Culture and Tourism is responsible for the
formulation and implementation of policies
concerning culture, arts, broadcasting
management, publications, printed matter,
sports, youth, overseas cultural information
services, and tourism. These functions are
undertaken by the Office of Religious Affairs;
and the Bureaus of Cultural Policy, Arts,
Culture Industry, Tourism, Sports, and Youth.
This ministry
operates, controls and supervises the largest
number of agencies of all the ministries. This
list includes the Office of Cultural Properties,
the Korean National University of Arts, the
National Academy of Arts, the National Museums,
the National Academy of Korean Language, the
National Library, the National Theater, the
National Museum of Contemporary Art, the
National Center for Korean Traditional
Performing Arts, the National Film Production
Center, the Government Publishing Office and the
National Folk Museum. It also supervises the
Korean Overseas Culture and Information Service.
In addition,
the Ministry is in charge of supporting and
guiding the following specialized groups. In the
field of art and culture, these include the
Korean Culture and Arts Foundation, the Seoul
Arts Center, the Korean Motion Picture Promotion
Corporation, and the Independence Hall. In the
field of sports, the Ministry supports the Korea
Sports Council, the Korean Olympic Committee,
and the Seoul Olympic Sports Foundation.
Finally, in the field of youth and well-being,
the Ministry oversees the Korea Institute for
Youth Development.
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Ministry
of Agriculture and Forestry
The Ministry
of Agriculture and Forestry is responsible for
policies concerning agricultural industry, rural
development, food, farmland, irrigation,
marketing of agricultural products, and
livestock. The Ministry is also responsible for
veterinary matters, land registration and
agrarian rights.
Included in
the Ministry are: the Bureaus of Agricultural
Policy, Food Grain Policy, International
Agriculture, Rural Development, Marketing
Policy, Agricultural Production and
Horticulture, and Livestock, and the
Agricultural Information and Statistics Office.
The Ministry operates the National Agricultural
Product Inspection Service, the National
Veterinary Research Service, and the National
Plant Inspection Service. The Ministry also
controls and supervises the Rural Development
Administration and the Forestry Administra-tion.
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Ministry
of Commerce, Industry and Energy
The Ministry
of Commerce, Industry and Energy is responsible
for commerce, foreign trade, trade promotion,
manufacturing industry, industrial zones,
energy, underground resources, electricity,
fuel, and thermal resource management. It also
handles patents and standards. In addition, the
Ministry is in charge of trademarks, brands,
cases of unfair competition, and import and
export regulations.
These
functions are carried out through the Office of
Trade Policy (with two bureau-level Offices of
Trade Policy, and Inter-national Trade
Promotion); the Office of Energy and Resources
Policy (with four bureau-level Officers of
Energy and Resources Policy, Energy Efficiency
and Conservation, Petroleum and Gas Policy, and
Electric Power Policy) as well as the Bureaus of
Industrial Policy, Technology Policy, Capital
Goods Industries, and Electronics, Textile and
Chemical Industries.
The Ministry
operates the Mine Registration Office, the Mine
Safety Office, and the Free Export Zone
Management Office. The Korean Trade Commission,
the Small and Medium Business Administration,
and the Korean Industrial Property Office are
all under the control and supervision of the
Ministry.
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Ministry
of Information and Communications
The Ministry
of Information and Communications handles all
matters concerning information and
communications, including informatization, radio
wave control, postal service, postal cheque
transfers and exchange, and postal banking and
insurance.
It carries out
these functions through the Planning &
Management Office, the Information &
Communications Policy Office, the Information
Planning Office, the Information &
Communications Promotion Bureau, the Radio &
Broadcasting Bureau, the Post Bureau, the Postal
Savings, the Insurance & Finance Bureau, and
the International Cooperation Office.
The Ministry
also operates the Information &
Communications Officials Training Institute, the
Radio Research Laboratory, the Electronic Data
Management Center, the Central Radio Monitoring
Office, the Regional Communications Office, and
the Secretariat of the Korea Communications
Commission.
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Ministry
of Health and Welfare
The Ministry
of Health and Welfare deals with all matters
related to public health, epidemiology, public
hygiene and sanitation, medical and
pharmaceutical policies, public assistance,
self-support care, support for women, children
and disabled persons, and all other social
welfare and human services programs.
The Ministry
undertakes these functions through the
Department of Social Welfare Policy (with three
Director-Generals of Social Welfare, Family
Welfare, and Disabled Persons Welfare); and the
Bureaus of Health Policy, Health Promotion,
Health Resource Management, and Pension and
Health Insurance.
This ministry
operates the National Medical Center, the
National Institute of Health, the National
Institute of Social Welfare Training, the
National Mental Hospital, the National Sorokto
Hospital, the National Rehabilitation Center,
the National Tuberculosis Hospital, and the
Central Epidemic Inspection Service. It also
controls and supervises the Korea Food and Drug
Administration.
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Ministry
of Environment
The Ministry
of Environment is in charge of policies and
programs for improving living environments,
preserving natural eco-systems, reducing and
recycling wastes, safely managing hazardous
substances, and promoting environmental
technologies, environmental education and public
awareness, of environmental issues, and
international environmental cooperation.
The Ministry
undertakes these functions through the Office of
Environmental Policy (with a bureau-level Office
of International Cooperation); through the
Bureaus of Nature Conservation, Air Quality
Management, Water Quality Management, Water
Supply and Sewage Treatment, Waste Management
and Recycling; and through Regional
Environmental Management Offices.
The Ministry
supervises the Central Environmental Disputes
Coordination Commission, the National Institute
of Environmental Research, the Environmental
Management Corporation, and the Korean Resources
Recovery and Reutilization Corporation.
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Ministry
of Labor
The Ministry
of Labor is responsible for labor-related issues
such as labor standards, industrial relations,
industrial safety and health, employment policy
and employment insurance, vocational training,
and so on.
It carries out
these functions through the Office of Employment
Policy (with three Bureau-level Offices for
Employment Policy Coordination, Employment
Insurance, and Human Resources Development); and
the Bureaus of Labor Policy, Labor Standards,
Industrial Safety and Health, and Working Women.
Under its direct control are: the Labor Training
Institute, the Central Employment Information
Office, and the Regional Administrations. Other
related institutions are the Central Labor
Relations Commission (and seven Local Labor
Relations Commissions), the Minimum Wage
Council, and the Industrial Accident
Deliberation Committee.
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Ministry
of Construction and Transportation
The Ministry
of Construction and Transportation is
responsible for the formulation of a national
comprehensive land development plan and the
coordination of a national construction plan.
Also within the Ministry's gambit are policies
and programs concerning conservation,
utilization, development and renovation of land
and water resources, construction of cities,
roads, and houses, management of rivers. The
Ministry also controls policies and programs
concerning land transportation and air
transportation.
These
functions are undertaken through the Offices of
Construction Affairs and Transport Policy; the
Bureaus of National Development Planning, Land,
Housing and Urban Affairs, Surface
Transportation, and Civil Aviation; and through
the Corps of the Highspeed Rail Construction
Project, the Corps of the New International
Airport Construction Project, and the
Metropolitan Transportation Planning Corps.
The Ministry
oversees the National Geography Institute, the
National Construc-tion Research Institute, the
Central Equipment Management Office, the
Regional Construction and Management Office, the
Regional Aviation Office, the Cheju Development
and the Construction Office, the Flood Control
Office, the Air Traffic Control Center, and the
Central Land Tribunal. It also supervises the
National Railroads Administration.
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Ministry
of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries
The Ministry
of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, established
in 1996, is the youngest ministry. It has
jurisdiction over fisheries, marine
transportation, construction and operation of
harbors, marine research, management of vessels
and seamen, conservation of marine environment,
marine science and technology, marine resources,
and marine accidents.
Its
constituent bureaus are: Marine Policy, Maritime
Transport and Seafarers, Port Policy, Port
Construction, Fisheries Policy and Fishery
Promotion.
Under its
jurisdiction, the Ministry runs the National
Fisheries Promotion Institute, the National
Marine Research Institute, the National Marine
Product Inspection Service, the Regional
Maritime and Fisheries Administration, and the
Central and Regional Marine Accident Courts. It
also supervises the National Maritime Police
Agency.
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Information
provided by the Korean Embassy
The
President of Korea
Since
the establishment of the Republic of Korea in
1948, Korea has maintained a presidential system
(except for a brief period between 1960-1961
when a parliamentary system was in place).
The President is the head of state and
represents the state to foreign states.
The President is also the head of the executive
branch, and the commander in chief of the armed
forces. in case of Presidential death or
disability, the Prime Minister - or, if
necessary, members of the State Council - will
temporarily act as the President according to an
order of succession provided by law.
The
President is elected for a single five-year term
by popular vote through universal, equal,
direct, secret balloting. This single-term
limitation reflects a reaction to past
experiences from the 1950s through the 1970s,
during which presidents, once in power, would
prolong their terms in office for extended
periods.
The
power and duties of the President are defined in
the following seven areas. First the President,
as head of state, symbolizes and represents the
whole nation in both the governmental system and
foreign relations. He receives foreign
diplomats, awards decorations and other honors,
and performs ceremonial and pardoning functions.
He has the duty to safeguard the independence,
territorial integrity, and continuity of the
state, as well as to protect the Constitution.
In addition, he is entrusted with the unique
duty to pursue the peaceful unification of the
Korean Peninsula.
Second,
the President, in his capacity as chief
executive, enforces all laws passed by the
legislature and issues orders and decrees for
the enforcement of these laws. The
President has the full power to direct the State
Council and oversee a varying number of advisory
organs and executive agencies. He is
authorized to appoint public officials including
the Prime Minister and heads of executive
agencies.
Third,
the President, in his capacity to as commander
in chief of the armed forces, has extensive
authority over military policy, including the
power to declare war.
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Fourth,
the President, under the current political
system, is customarily leader of his political
part. He appoints key positions in the
party. He frequently consults with his
party in appointing top-level personnel for the
executive branch.
Fifth,
the President is chief policy maker and chief
lawmaker. He may propose legislative bills
to the National Assembly or express his views to
the legislators in person or in writing.
The President cannot dissolve the National
Assembly; rather, it is the National Assembly
that may hold the President accountable under
the Constitution by means of the impeachment
process.
Sixth,
the President is vested with extensive emergency
powers. In case of internal turmoil,
external menace, natural disaster or severe
financial or economic crisis, the President can
take emergency financial and economic actions or
issue orders that have the effect of law.
The President can exercise these powers only
when there in insufficient time to convene the
National Assembly, and the actions or orders are
absolutely essential to maintaining national
security or public order. The President
must subsequently notify, and obtain the
concurrence of, the National Assembly. If
he is unsuccessful in doing so, the measures
will be nullified.
Seventh,
and finally, the President is also empowered to
declare a state of martial law in accordance
with the provisions of the law in time of war,
armed struggle, or similar national emergency.
The exercise of such emergency power is,
however, subject to ex post facto approval of
the National Assembly.
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Information
provided by the Korean Embassy
The
Prime Minister of Korea
Unlike
the Prime Minister under a parliamentary system,
where he/she is the chief executive, the Prime
Minister of Korea is the principal executive
assistant to the President. It is within
this capacity (under the direction of the
President) that the Prime Minister supervises
the executive ministries. The Prime
Minister is appointed by the President.
There are no established rules, written or
customary, as to whom the President may appoint
to the post. The only obligation is to
obtain the approval of the National Assembly
before the appointment.
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Korea's
State Council
If
often takes a group consensus to resolve policy
issues in a balanced, well-reasoned way. A
mechanism to meet this need in the executive
branch of the Korean government is the State
Council. Similar to a cabinet meeting, the
State Council, consisting of fifteen to thirty
members, is the top level collective
deliberative body, with the President serving as
chairman and the Prime Minister serving as
vice-chairman.
The
Council reviews important government policies
before the President makes final decisions.
The present State Council is composed of the
President, the Prime Minister and the heads of
the seventeen executive ministries and provides
a forum for deliberation on major government
policies and advises the President accordingly.
Constitutionally speaking, the Council is a
consultative and reviewing body, and not a
decision-making body.
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The
Korean National
Assembly
Organizations
 Legislative
power is vested in the National Assembly, a
unicameral body. The organizational components
of the National Assembly are the individual
members, the presiding officers, the plenary,
the committees, the negotiation groups, and the
administrative organs for legislative
assistance.
The Assembly
is composed of 299 members, 253 elected from
single-member electoral districts and 46 shared
by their parties in proportional representation.
All members serve a four-year term.
To be eligible
for election, a candidate must be at least 25
years of age. One candidate from each electoral
district is chosen by a plurality of votes.
Unless convicted of a crime, a member cannot be
apprehended or detained without the consent of
the National Assembly. A member is also exempt
from liability for speech or voting performed in
relation to his/her duties in the National
Assembly.
The presiding
officers, the Speaker and two Vice speakers are
elected to two-year terms through voting in the
plenary with the approval of the registered
members. The Speaker represents the National
Assembly, presides over the parliamentary
proceedings, maintains order in the house, and
oversees its administration. In the Speaker's
absence, a Vice speaker performs the duties.
The Plenary is
the highest decision-making body of the National
Assembly, consisting of all members. The plenary
deliberation of a bill usually begins with a
report from the relevant committee, followed by
question and answer, debate, and voting. The
Plenary is often addressed by the President of
the Republic. It also hears from the leaders of
negotiation groups on behalf of their respective
political parties, and carries out
interpellation, during which members address
questions to, and receives answers, from cabinet
members regarding the national administration.
As of May 1998, the 15th National Assembly
consisted of 150 seats for the Grand National
Party, 84 seats for the National Congress for
New Politics and 48 seats for the United Liberal
Democrats.
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Committees
Committees are
established for preliminary deliberation of
matters that require the National Assembly's
decision. A standing committee deliberates bills
and petitions under its jurisdiction and
performs other duties as defined by law. A
special committee is established as the need
arises for the Assembly's attention on
particular matters.
The Assembly
is divided into 16 standing committees with the
following functional designations: House
Steering Committee; Legislation and Judiciary;
National Policy; Finance and Economy;
Unification, Foreign Affairs and Trade; National
Defense; Government Administration and Local
Autonomy; Education; Science, Technology,
Information and Telecommunications; Culture and
Tourism; Agriculture, Forestry, Maritime Affairs
and Fisheries; Commerce, Industry and Energy;
Health and Welfare; Environment and Labor;
Construction and Transportation; and
Intelligence. Members serve for two years. The
committee chairman is authorized to control the
proceedings, maintain order, and represent the
committee. Bills and petitions are referred to
the standing committees for examination. The
committees constitute the chief forum for
reconciling differences between ruling and
opposition parties.
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Meetings
Two types of
legislative sessions are provided, regular and
extraordinary. A regular session is convened
once every year in accordance with the
provisions of the law. Extraordinary sessions
may be convened upon the request of the
President or a quarter or more of the members of
the Assembly. The period of a regular session is
limited to 100 days, that of an extraordinary
session, to 30 days.
If the
President requests the convening of an
extraordinary session, he must clearly specify
the period of the session and the reasons for
the request. During an extraordinary session
convened at the call of the President, only
bills submitted by the President will be
deliberated within the stipulated period. Except
as otherwise provided in the Constitution or
law, the attendance of more than one half of the
Assembly members duly elected and seated, and
the concurrent vote of more than one half of the
Assembly members present, are necessary to make
decisions of the National Assembly binding. In
case of a tie vote, the matter is considered to
be rejected by the National Assembly.
Legislative sessions are open to the public, but
this rule can be waived with the approval of
more than one half of the members present or
when the Speaker deems it necessary to do so in
the interest of national security.
The plenary
voting takes the form of standing, open,
electronic, roll call, or secret balloting. The
Assembly holds public hearings to gather expert
opinion on important matters or bills requiring
professional knowledge. On matters of grave
national concern or while auditing or
investigating the government, the National
Assembly may also hold investigative hearings to
get testimonies and evidence from witnesses,
experts, and informants.
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Negotiation
Groups
Under the
present National Assembly Act, each political
group having 20 or more assemblymen may form a
negotiating group which acts as a unit in
interparty negotiations within the Assembly.
Assemblymen without party affiliation can form
separate negotiations groups if their number is
20 or more. Each negotiating group names floor
leader and whip, who are responsible for
negotiating with other groups. The floor leaders
meet to discuss matters relating to the
operation of the Assembly, meeting schedules,
and debating orders of the items on agendas for
plenary sessions and committee meetings.
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Powers
and Activities
The National
Assembly deliberates bills, including
legislative bills, the government's budget bill,
and proposals for ratification of international
treaties. It also carries out inspection and
audit of the administration, as well as engages
in interparliamentary activities.
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Deliberation
of Bills and Foreign Policy
A bill may be
introduced by an assemblyman with the
concurrence of 20 or more Assembly members, or
by the administration. When a bill is proposed
or submitted, the Speaker refers it to the
pertinent committee for consideration. For
extensive examination, a committee may establish
subcommittees under its authority. With the
approval of the Speaker, a committee may hold
public hearings to examine budget bills, and
other important bills or matters requiring
professional knowledge, and solicit opinions
from interested persons or experts.
Once a bill is
acted upon, the committee's actions are reported
to the Assembly floor. A bill voted down may not
be referred to a plenary meeting unless the
speaker requests that it be dealt with at a
plenary session. On the floor, the bill voted
upon may be amended, rejected, approved, or sent
back to the committee. Each bill passed by the
Assembly is sent to the Executive branch and the
President must ratify it within 15 days; he may
also veto it and provide an explanatory
statement to the legislature for
reconsideration. The Assembly can, however,
override a Presidential veto with the attendance
of more than one half of the membership and with
a two-thirds majority vote of the members
present. The bill in question then becomes law.
The Assembly
has the right of consent to the ratification of
treaties pertaining to mutual assistance or
mutual security, treaties concerning
international organizations, treaties of
commerce, fisheries and peace, treaties which
cause a financial obligation to the state or
people, treaties concerning the status of
foreign armed forces on Korean territory, and
treaties related to legislative matters. The
Assembly also has the right to approve a
declaration of war, the dispatch of armed forces
abroad, or the stationing of alien forces within
the country. It also approves emergency orders
and general amnesty.
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Audit
and Inspection of Fiscal administration
The National
Assembly deliberates and finalizes the
government's budget bill. The Executive branch
must formulate the budget bill for each fiscal
year and submit it to the National Assembly at
least 90 days before the beginning of a new
fiscal year. The Assembly is required to decide
upon the budget bill at least 30 days before the
beginning of a new fiscal year. Issuance of
national bonds and entering into contracts
chargeable to the national treasury other than
those authorized in the budget require the prior
approval of the Assembly. The Assembly also
screens the government's account, which is
submitted 120 days before the start of the new
fiscal year. Its fiscal power extends to laws
concerning taxation, the items and rates of
which must be fixed by law.
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Power
Regarding National Administration
The Assembly
inspects the affairs of state or investigates
the specific matters of state affairs. When
requested by the Assembly or its committees, the
Prime Minister, State Council members, and
representatives of the Executive branch must
appear before the Assembly and answer questions.
The Legislature has the power to adopt a motion
recommending to the President the dismissal of
the Prime Minister or any member of the State
Council. A motion for removal of Executive
officials may be introduced by one third or more
members of the Assembly, and passed with the
concurrence of more than one half of the members
of the Assembly.
The Assembly
has the power to impeach the President, the
Prime Minister, members of the State Council,
heads of executive ministries, members of the
Constitutional Court, judges, members of the
National Election Commission, members of the
Board of Audit and Inspection or any other
public officials designated by law, on the
grounds of violating the Constitution, or any
other law, in the performance of their duties.
A motion for
impeachment must be proposed by one third or
more of the membership of the Assembly. The vote
of a majority of the Assembly is necessary to
carry out an impeachment motion. A motion of
impeachment against the President must be
proposed by a majority of the members of the
Assembly. A person against whom impeachment
proceedings have been instituted is suspended
from exercising power until the end of the
impeachment proceedings. The effect of
impeachment is limited to dismissal from public
position. However, this does not exempt the
impeached person from civil or criminal
liability.
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Interparliamentary
Activities
The National
Assembly takes part in various
interparliamentary organizations and meetings.
It has been a member of the Inter-Parliamentary
Union (IPU), since 1964, and has hosted the 70th
Inter-Parliamentary Conference in 1983 and the
97th Conference in 1997.
The Assembly
was an inaugural member when the Asia-Pacific
Parliamentarians Union (APPU) was founded in
1965. It has hosted six meetings of the
organization. It also belongs to the
Asia-Pacific Parliamentary Forum (APPF) and, in
1998, held the 8th Annual Meeting of the Forum.
Since 1979, the Assembly has taken part as both
an observer in the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary
Organization (AIPO) and a dialogue partner,
since 1990. To promote exchanges and cooperation
with its foreign counterparts, the Assembly has
established 65 parliamentary friendship
associations.
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The
Korean Civil Service System
The Korean
civil service is based on a grade system which
reflects a strong tradition of seniority.
Position assignments are made strictly according
to grade, and remuneration is based on grade and
length of service. The civil service is also
characteristically a closed system: recruitment
from outside is allowed only at certain grade
levels, with age limitations imposed in favor of
the young. Vacant positions, except at the
lowest grade level, are filled mostly by
promotions based on seniority. Korean civil
servants, under provisions of the Civil Service
Law, are servants of the people. They are
required to be kind, fair and sincere.
Size
As of May 31,
1998, the Korean civil service was comprised of
933,384 individuals employed by both central and
local governments in various job areas and grade
levels. Of this number, 915,750 work for the
executive branch (559,081 at the central
government level, including 286,000 teachers,
91,500 police force and fire fighters, and
356,669 civil servants working at the local
level). An additional 3,346 persons work for the
legislature (12,078 for the judiciary, and 2,210
for the Constitutional Court and the National
Election Commission). The ratio of civil
servants to the nation's population is roughly 1
to 49.
The May 31,
1998 figure for the civil service size reflects
an increase of 635 over one year period. The
civil service sector has grown rapidly. Civil
servants numbered 253,186 in 1962, 417,348 in
1970, 596,431 in 1980, 818,121 in 1990, and
reached a peak of 936,689 in February 1998, when
the current government of President Kim Dae-jung
was inaugurated. The new administration soon
began taking measures to reduce its size. The
downsizing efforts of the current government
resulted in a decrease of 3,305 employees for
the three-month period between February 1998 and
May 1998.
Classification
Civil servants
are broadly classified into two groups:
"career" civil servants and
"special career" (i.e. non-career)
civil servants. The career civil servants
constitute an absolute majority, as they include
all the groups categorized as: general services
personnel (those in engineering, research, and
general administrative jobs); special services
personnel (judges, prosecutors, diplomatic,
police, fire-fighting, educational, and military
personnel, civilian employees in the military,
employees of the national intelligence service,
and other personnel classified as special
services by other laws); and technical services
personnel (those in various technical and
clerical services). The special career civil
servants include: politically determined
personnel (elected officials of all kinds,
officials requiring consent by the National
Assembly before appointment, and high ranking
political appointees usually at the
vice-ministerial level or above); specially
designated services personnel (other political
appointees and those in positions designated as
requiring special talents or skills);
contract-based personnel (experts employed
through fixed-period contracts); and manual
workers.
Classification
of career civil servants, other than by area of
service as indicated above, is based on grades.
There are nine grades, with grade 1 being the
highest (assistant minister level) and 9 the
lowest. This grade system applies fully to the
engineering and administrative job groups. Other
job groups, although not so well suited for this
grade system, widely use so-called
"grade-equivalency" to define one's
status relative to those in the administrative
job group. For instance, the principals of
public schools, the chiefs of police stations,
researchers who are the heads of divisions in
research agencies-all are regarded as being
equivalent to a grade 4 official in the
administrative group (a division chief in a
central government agency). Qualification of
every government position is specified strictly
in terms of the title. A bureau chief, for
instance, should be an administrative associate
executive manager (grade 3) or an administrative
executive manager (grade 2); a division chief
should be an administrative senior manager, or a
chemical engineering senior manager (grade 4),
or an administrative associate executive manager
(grade 3), and so forth. It is in this manner
that position assignments are strictly
grade-based.
Recruitments
New outside
recruitments for career service are made at the
9th, 7th, and 5th grade levels. Manpower
vacancies at the 9th grade are met by new
recruitments, while vacancies at the 7th and 5th
grades are filled in large part by promotions
and, to a lesser extent, through new
recruitments. New recruitments are made through
competitive written examinations. These new
recruitments are intended to infuse fresh, young
blood into the civil service system.
Apart from
this limited scope for new recruitments and a
recently introduced expert recruitment system
(in which a limited number of positions are
designated for contract-based appointments from
both inside and outside the civil service
sector), vacant positions are filled by
promotions. Grade promotions are made either by
competitive examination or by reviews among
candidates. To be a candidate for promotion, one
should first meet the minimum grade-specific
length-of-service requirements, and then climb
up through the list of candidates until he/she
reaches the top range. In climbing up the list,
the results of performance evaluation and
training matter to some extent, but seniority is
the key. It is in this sense that promotions are
mainly seniority-based.
Remuneration
Pay for public
servants is a function of grade and length of
career. Those at the same grade with the same
length of career receive the same amount of pay,
regardless of job group, education or any other
job-related abilities. The pay system consists
of a basic salary that makes up about 45 percent
of total pay, and an array of special
compensations in the form of bonuses and
allowances. Everyone gets a within-the-grade
step increase once a year.
Current
Government Reform Efforts
Faced with
growing needs for a clean, democratic,
decentralized, and competitive government to
help society cope effectively with increasing
international competition, the Korean government
over the last several years has taken various
steps to reform its traditional structure and
methods of operation. Under pressures associated
with an unprecedented economic crisis which
began in late 1997, the government is now facing
an even greater, and more urgent need to reform
itself into a cleaner, more efficient
organization.
The current
government started by reducing the number of
executive ministries from 23 to 17 when it was
launched in February 1998, and is now working on
a wide range of programs to drastically
restructure the entire public sector. Included
in the government reform programs are: the
downsizing of the public sector, including
central and local governments, public
enterprises and other government-supported
organizations, the introduction of competition
into the civil service through the use of
performance-based pay and merit-based
promotions; the substantial increase of
contract-based appointments of experts; the
introduction of incentives for curbing
government spending; the reduction of government
bureaucracy and regulations; and the downsizing
of the central government through continued
decentralization.
Local
Government
Local
governments, according to Article 117 of the
Constitution, "shall deal with matters
pertaining to the well-being of local residents,
shall manage properties, and may establish their
own rules and regulations regarding local
autonomy as delegated by national laws and
decrees." (It should be noted that, unless
otherwise specificied, "local
government" here refers broadly to
sub-national governments at the provincial as
well as municipal levels.) This constitutional
provision, however, remained largely unfulfilled
until July 1995, when the nation witnessed, for
the first time in more than thirty years, the
inauguration of popularly elected governors and
mayors for provincial and local governments.
Until then (except for a period of less than one
year just before the military coup d'etat of
1961 when a parliamentary system was in place)
local governments were no more than local
administrative districts of the central
government. The heads of local governments (in
effect, simply administrative authorities) were
appointed by the central government, and their
capacity for autonomous decision-making was
virtually nonexistent.
Highly
centralized governments have been a strong
tradition in Korea, extending back more than six
hundred years to the establishment of the ChosCon
Dynasty (1392-1910). Thus, even with the advent
of decentralization and popularly-elected local
governments, a long road lies ahead before
achieving local autonomy to a degree and extent
practiced today in advanced societies.
The second
comprehensive local elections was held on June
4, 1998, three years after the first elections
in 1995. Beginning with the 1998 elections,
local elections will take place every four
years.
The functions
of the elected local government CEOs, according
to law, include: any functions delegated by the
central government; management of public
properties and facilities; assessment and
collection of local taxes and fees; provision of
services and goods to residents; and management
of other administrative affairs. Each of the
local governments has a Board of Education for
handling education and cultural matters within
its jurisdictions. Local councils are also
authorized to inspect and audit local
governments.
Administrative
system
Currently,
there are 16 provincial-level governments, and
235 lower-level local governments (hereafter,
municipal governments), including 72 shi (city)
governments, 94 gun (county) governments,
and 69 gu (borough) governments within
the provincial-level metropolitan cities.
Provincial governments, although they have to
some extent, their own functions, basically
serve as an intermediary between the central and
municipal governments. Thus, their
administrative systems resemble smaller versions
of the central government's system. In fact,
administrative units generally represent
one-to-one matches with the central government's
ministries and agencies, such that policies and
programs directed by a specific central agency
can be handled (received, conveyed to the
municipalities, and reported back from the
municipalities to the central agency) by a
corresponding unit in the provincial government.
The administrative systems within municipal
governments are, for similar reasons, not
dissimilar to those of the provincial
governments. Thus, the administrative systems of
all levels of governments, even those of the
non-autonomous administrative districts at still
lower levels beneath municipal governments, can
be characterized in two words: uniform and
comprehensive.
Municipal
governments deliver services to the residents
through an administrative district system. This
system consists of what are called Cup
and myCon in
the gun government or less urbanized
areas in the shi government, and dong
in the gu government or urbanized areas
in the shi government. Each municipal
government has several of these districts which
serve as field offices for handling service
needs of their constituents (their number
ranging from about 5,000 to 20,000 residents
depending on the size of jurisdiction areas and
population density). District offices are
engaged mainly in routine and simple
administrative and social service functions.
Unusual and complex matters are dealt with
directly by the municipal governments. Some
essential functions, like public safety, road
signs, fire protection, public schools,
prosecution, and correction, are handled
directly by central or provincial governments
through their own field offices; and some other
functions like public health and extension
services are handled directly by the municipal
government through separate delivery systems.
Local
governments account for 32 percent of the total
government employment, with 356,669 employees as
of May 31, 1998, in both provincial and
municipal governments they also account for 36
percent of total government expenditures. Their
personnel and budgets are strictly controlled by
the central government, with the Ministry of
Government Administration and Home Affairs being
the primary supervising and controlling agency.
Personnel systems, including classification,
recruitment, promotion, and remuneration, are
all the same as those of the central government.
This is because every policy determined by the
central government applies uniformly nationwide.
Intergovernmental
Relations
Local
governments depend heavily on the central
government for decisions and funding for their
roles and functions, organization and personnel,
and budgets. Their main function is to implement
centrally determined policies and programs as
directed and guided by central government
ministries and agencies. Local governments do
not have their own judicial, prosecution,
police, or education systems. These systems
belong to, and are operated exclusively by, the
central government.
On the
organization and personnel side, deputy CEOs
are, by law, dispatched by the central
government (by the Ministry of Government
Administration and Home Affairs, to be more
specific). It is these deputies that hold the
authority to control all administrative matters
of local governments. Any major changes in
organization or manpower structure are subject
to approval by the higher level of government,
meaning the central government must approve
changes in the provincial government, and the
provincial government must approve changes in
the municipal government. All policies governing
personnel, including recruitment, promotion,
performance evaluation, work conditions, and
remuneration, are centrally established in a
uniform fashion such that no variation may
exist.
Financially,
local governments rely so heavily on the central
government that, if funding were withheld, the
majority of them would cease operations within a
month or two after commencing a new budget year.
This is owing to several reasons, including a
lack of balance in the distribution of revenue
sources between the central and local
governments and more fundamentally, a poor tax
base in many of the local governments.
Reform
Efforts
Local
governments will soon be a subject of major
reforms in their organization, personnel, and
modes of operation. Reform measures, to be
initiated by the central government, will likely
include: the downsizing of organizations, not
only internal and external administrative units,
but also local public enterprises, and other
organizations financially supported by the local
government, as well as overseas offices;
manpower reduction and restructuring, and the
introduction of business-like management
systems.
According to a
reform plan drafted by the Ministry of
Government Administration and Home Affairs, the
municipal governments' administrative district
offices (Cup, myCon,
and dong) will be substantially reduced
in number and converted into social service
centers; an electronic resident registration
card system will soon be introduced, replacing
the current paper-based document systems; the
management of government-operated sewage
treatment plants, cultural centers, and sports
facilities will be contracted out to the private
sector; and a substantial proportion of the work
performed by unskilled administrative and
clerical support personnel, manual laborers,
security guards, garbage collectors, street
sweepers, and road repair workers will be
reduced or contracted out. All these measures
will result in an estimated reduction of 87,000
employees, or 30 percent of all local government
manpower nationwide. In addition, local public
enterprises will also be forced to reduce their
manpower sizes, and dozens of local
government-attached development corps will be
shut down over time.
Besides these
organizational and manpower downsizing measures,
the Ministry of Government Administration and
Home Affairs is planning to introduce an array
of new performance management systems. Aimed at
eliminating lackluster performance on the part
of local government officials, the new
performance management system will include:
individual performance management under the
concept of management by objective; introduction
of point systems to be applied to compensation
and promotion decisions; introduction of an
annual salary contract system; and expansion of
positions to be held by contract-based
appointees and experts.
The
Korean Civil Service System
The Korean
civil service is based on a grade system which
reflects a strong tradition of seniority.
Position assignments are made strictly according
to grade, and remuneration is based on grade and
length of service. The civil service is also
characteristically a closed system: recruitment
from outside is allowed only at certain grade
levels, with age limitations imposed in favor of
the young. Vacant positions, except at the
lowest grade level, are filled mostly by
promotions based on seniority. Korean civil
servants, under provisions of the Civil Service
Law, are servants of the people. They are
required to be kind, fair and sincere.
Size
As of May 31,
1998, the Korean civil service was comprised of
933,384 individuals employed by both central and
local governments in various job areas and grade
levels. Of this number, 915,750 work for the
executive branch (559,081 at the central
government level, including 286,000 teachers,
91,500 police force and fire fighters, and
356,669 civil servants working at the local
level). An additional 3,346 persons work for the
legislature (12,078 for the judiciary, and 2,210
for the Constitutional Court and the National
Election Commission). The ratio of civil
servants to the nation's population is roughly 1
to 49.
The May 31,
1998 figure for the civil service size reflects
an increase of 635 over one year period. The
civil service sector has grown rapidly. Civil
servants numbered 253,186 in 1962, 417,348 in
1970, 596,431 in 1980, 818,121 in 1990, and
reached a peak of 936,689 in February 1998, when
the current government of President Kim Dae-jung
was inaugurated. The new administration soon
began taking measures to reduce its size. The
downsizing efforts of the current government
resulted in a decrease of 3,305 employees for
the three-month period between February 1998 and
May 1998.
Classification
Civil servants
are broadly classified into two groups:
"career" civil servants and
"special career" (i.e. non-career)
civil servants. The career civil servants
constitute an absolute majority, as they include
all the groups categorized as: general services
personnel (those in engineering, research, and
general administrative jobs); special services
personnel (judges, prosecutors, diplomatic,
police, fire-fighting, educational, and military
personnel, civilian employees in the military,
employees of the national intelligence service,
and other personnel classified as special
services by other laws); and technical services
personnel (those in various technical and
clerical services). The special career civil
servants include: politically determined
personnel (elected officials of all kinds,
officials requiring consent by the National
Assembly before appointment, and high ranking
political appointees usually at the
vice-ministerial level or above); specially
designated services personnel (other political
appointees and those in positions designated as
requiring special talents or skills);
contract-based personnel (experts employed
through fixed-period contracts); and manual
workers.
Classification
of career civil servants, other than by area of
service as indicated above, is based on grades.
There are nine grades, with grade 1 being the
highest (assistant minister level) and 9 the
lowest. This grade system applies fully to the
engineering and administrative job groups. Other
job groups, although not so well suited for this
grade system, widely use so-called
"grade-equivalency" to define one's
status relative to those in the administrative
job group. For instance, the principals of
public schools, the chiefs of police stations,
researchers who are the heads of divisions in
research agencies-all are regarded as being
equivalent to a grade 4 official in the
administrative group (a division chief in a
central government agency). Qualification of
every government position is specified strictly
in terms of the title. A bureau chief, for
instance, should be an administrative associate
executive manager (grade 3) or an administrative
executive manager (grade 2); a division chief
should be an administrative senior manager, or a
chemical engineering senior manager (grade 4),
or an administrative associate executive manager
(grade 3), and so forth. It is in this manner
that position assignments are strictly
grade-based.
Recruitments
New outside
recruitments for career service are made at the
9th, 7th, and 5th grade levels. Manpower
vacancies at the 9th grade are met by new
recruitments, while vacancies at the 7th and 5th
grades are filled in large part by promotions
and, to a lesser extent, through new
recruitments. New recruitments are made through
competitive written examinations. These new
recruitments are intended to infuse fresh, young
blood into the civil service system.
Apart from
this limited scope for new recruitments and a
recently introduced expert recruitment system
(in which a limited number of positions are
designated for contract-based appointments from
both inside and outside the civil service
sector), vacant positions are filled by
promotions. Grade promotions are made either by
competitive examination or by reviews among
candidates. To be a candidate for promotion, one
should first meet the minimum grade-specific
length-of-service requirements, and then climb
up through the list of candidates until he/she
reaches the top range. In climbing up the list,
the results of performance evaluation and
training matter to some extent, but seniority is
the key. It is in this sense that promotions are
mainly seniority-based.
Remuneration
Pay for public
servants is a function of grade and length of
career. Those at the same grade with the same
length of career receive the same amount of pay,
regardless of job group, education or any other
job-related abilities. The pay system consists
of a basic salary that makes up about 45 percent
of total pay, and an array of special
compensations in the form of bonuses and
allowances. Everyone gets a within-the-grade
step increase once a year.
Current
Government Reform Efforts
Faced with
growing needs for a clean, democratic,
decentralized, and competitive government to
help society cope effectively with increasing
international competition, the Korean government
over the last several years has taken various
steps to reform its traditional structure and
methods of operation. Under pressures associated
with an unprecedented economic crisis which
began in late 1997, the government is now facing
an even greater, and more urgent need to reform
itself into a cleaner, more efficient
organization.
The current
government started by reducing the number of
executive ministries from 23 to 17 when it was
launched in February 1998, and is now working on
a wide range of programs to drastically
restructure the entire public sector. Included
in the government reform programs are: the
downsizing of the public sector, including
central and local governments, public
enterprises and other government-supported
organizations, the introduction of competition
into the civil service through the use of
performance-based pay and merit-based
promotions; the substantial increase of
contract-based appointments of experts; the
introduction of incentives for curbing
government spending; the reduction of government
bureaucracy and regulations; and the downsizing
of the central government through continued
decentralization.
Local
Government
Local
governments, according to Article 117 of the
Constitution, "shall deal with matters
pertaining to the well-being of local residents,
shall manage properties, and may establish their
own rules and regulations regarding local
autonomy as delegated by national laws and
decrees." (It should be noted that, unless
otherwise specificied, "local
government" here refers broadly to
sub-national governments at the provincial as
well as municipal levels.) This constitutional
provision, however, remained largely unfulfilled
until July 1995, when the nation witnessed, for
the first time in more than thirty years, the
inauguration of popularly elected governors and
mayors for provincial and local governments.
Until then (except for a period of less than one
year just before the military coup d'etat of
1961 when a parliamentary system was in place)
local governments were no more than local
administrative districts of the central
government. The heads of local governments (in
effect, simply administrative authorities) were
appointed by the central government, and their
capacity for autonomous decision-making was
virtually nonexistent.
Highly
centralized governments have been a strong
tradition in Korea, extending back more than six
hundred years to the establishment of the ChosCon
Dynasty (1392-1910). Thus, even with the advent
of decentralization and popularly-elected local
governments, a long road lies ahead before
achieving local autonomy to a degree and extent
practiced today in advanced societies.
The second
comprehensive local elections was held on June
4, 1998, three years after the first elections
in 1995. Beginning with the 1998 elections,
local elections will take place every four
years.
The functions
of the elected local government CEOs, according
to law, include: any functions delegated by the
central government; management of public
properties and facilities; assessment and
collection of local taxes and fees; provision of
services and goods to residents; and management
of other administrative affairs. Each of the
local governments has a Board of Education for
handling education and cultural matters within
its jurisdictions. Local councils are also
authorized to inspect and audit local
governments.
Administrative
system
Currently,
there are 16 provincial-level governments, and
235 lower-level local governments (hereafter,
municipal governments), including 72 shi (city)
governments, 94 gun (county) governments,
and 69 gu (borough) governments within
the provincial-level metropolitan cities.
Provincial governments, although they have to
some extent, their own functions, basically
serve as an intermediary between the central and
municipal governments. Thus, their
administrative systems resemble smaller versions
of the central government's system. In fact,
administrative units generally represent
one-to-one matches with the central government's
ministries and agencies, such that policies and
programs directed by a specific central agency
can be handled (received, conveyed to the
municipalities, and reported back from the
municipalities to the central agency) by a
corresponding unit in the provincial government.
The administrative systems within municipal
governments are, for similar reasons, not
dissimilar to those of the provincial
governments. Thus, the administrative systems of
all levels of governments, even those of the
non-autonomous administrative districts at still
lower levels beneath municipal governments, can
be characterized in two words: uniform and
comprehensive.
Municipal
governments deliver services to the residents
through an administrative district system. This
system consists of what are called Cup
and myCon in
the gun government or less urbanized
areas in the shi government, and dong
in the gu government or urbanized areas
in the shi government. Each municipal
government has several of these districts which
serve as field offices for handling service
needs of their constituents (their number
ranging from about 5,000 to 20,000 residents
depending on the size of jurisdiction areas and
population density). District offices are
engaged mainly in routine and simple
administrative and social service functions.
Unusual and complex matters are dealt with
directly by the municipal governments. Some
essential functions, like public safety, road
signs, fire protection, public schools,
prosecution, and correction, are handled
directly by central or provincial governments
through their own field offices; and some other
functions like public health and extension
services are handled directly by the municipal
government through separate delivery systems.
Local
governments account for 32 percent of the total
government employment, with 356,669 employees as
of May 31, 1998, in both provincial and
municipal governments they also account for 36
percent of total government expenditures. Their
personnel and budgets are strictly controlled by
the central government, with the Ministry of
Government Administration and Home Affairs being
the primary supervising and controlling agency.
Personnel systems, including classification,
recruitment, promotion, and remuneration, are
all the same as those of the central government.
This is because every policy determined by the
central government applies uniformly nationwide.
Intergovernmental
Relations
Local
governments depend heavily on the central
government for decisions and funding for their
roles and functions, organization and personnel,
and budgets. Their main function is to implement
centrally determined policies and programs as
directed and guided by central government
ministries and agencies. Local governments do
not have their own judicial, prosecution,
police, or education systems. These systems
belong to, and are operated exclusively by, the
central government.
On the
organization and personnel side, deputy CEOs
are, by law, dispatched by the central
government (by the Ministry of Government
Administration and Home Affairs, to be more
specific). It is these deputies that hold the
authority to control all administrative matters
of local governments. Any major changes in
organization or manpower structure are subject
to approval by the higher level of government,
meaning the central government must approve
changes in the provincial government, and the
provincial government must approve changes in
the municipal government. All policies governing
personnel, including recruitment, promotion,
performance evaluation, work conditions, and
remuneration, are centrally established in a
uniform fashion such that no variation may
exist.
Financially,
local governments rely so heavily on the central
government that, if funding were withheld, the
majority of them would cease operations within a
month or two after commencing a new budget year.
This is owing to several reasons, including a
lack of balance in the distribution of revenue
sources between the central and local
governments and more fundamentally, a poor tax
base in many of the local governments.
Reform
Efforts
Local
governments will soon be a subject of major
reforms in their organization, personnel, and
modes of operation. Reform measures, to be
initiated by the central government, will likely
include: the downsizing of organizations, not
only internal and external administrative units,
but also local public enterprises, and other
organizations financially supported by the local
government, as well as overseas offices;
manpower reduction and restructuring, and the
introduction of business-like management
systems.
According to a
reform plan drafted by the Ministry of
Government Administration and Home Affairs, the
municipal governments' administrative district
offices (Cup, myCon,
and dong) will be substantially reduced
in number and converted into social service
centers; an electronic resident registration
card system will soon be introduced, replacing
the current paper-based document systems; the
management of government-operated sewage
treatment plants, cultural centers, and sports
facilities will be contracted out to the private
sector; and a substantial proportion of the work
performed by unskilled administrative and
clerical support personnel, manual laborers,
security guards, garbage collectors, street
sweepers, and road repair workers will be
reduced or contracted out. All these measures
will result in an estimated reduction of 87,000
employees, or 30 percent of all local government
manpower nationwide. In addition, local public
enterprises will also be forced to reduce their
manpower sizes, and dozens of local
government-attached development corps will be
shut down over time.
Besides these
organizational and manpower downsizing measures,
the Ministry of Government Administration and
Home Affairs is planning to introduce an array
of new performance management systems. Aimed at
eliminating lackluster performance on the part
of local government officials, the new
performance management system will include:
individual performance management under the
concept of management by objective; introduction
of point systems to be applied to compensation
and promotion decisions; introduction of an
annual salary contract system; and expansion of
positions to be held by contract-based
appointees and experts.
Government
::Korea, South
|
Country name:
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|
conventional long form: Republic
of Korea
conventional short form: South
Korea
local long form: Taehan-min'guk
local short form: Han'guk
abbreviation: ROK
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Government type:
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republic
|
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Capital:
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name: Seoul
geographic coordinates: 37
33 N, 126 59 E
time difference: UTC+9
(14 hours ahead of Washington, DC during
Standard Time)
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Administrative divisions:
|
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9 provinces (do, singular and
plural) and 7 metropolitan cities (gwangyoksi,
singular and plural)
provinces: Cheju-do,
Cholla-bukto (North Cholla), Cholla-namdo (South
Cholla), Ch'ungch'ong-bukto (North Ch'ungch'ong),
Ch'ungch'ong-namdo (South Ch'ungch'ong), Kangwon-do,
Kyonggi-do, Kyongsang-bukto (North Kyongsang),
Kyongsang-namdo (South Kyongsang)
metropolitan cities: Inch'on-gwangyoksi,
Kwangju-gwangyoksi, Pusan-gwangyoksi, Soul-t'ukpyolsi
(Seoul), Taegu-gwangyoksi, Taejon-gwangyoksi,
Ulsan-gwangyoksi
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Independence:
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15 August 1945 (from Japan)
|
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National holiday:
|
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Liberation Day, 15 August
(1945)
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Constitution:
|
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17 July 1948; note - amended
or rewritten many times; current constitution
approved on 29 October 1987
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Legal system:
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combines elements of
continental European civil law systems,
Anglo-American law, and Chinese classical
thought; has not accepted compulsory ICJ
jurisdiction
|
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Suffrage:
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19 years of age; universal
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Executive branch:
|
|
chief of state: President
LEE Myung-bak (since 25 February 2008)
head of government: Prime
Minister KIM Hwang-sik (since 1 October 2010)
cabinet: State
Council appointed by the president on the prime
minister's recommendation
(For
more information visit the World
Leaders website  )
elections: president
elected by popular vote for a single five-year
term; election last held on 19 December 2007
(next to be held in December 2012); prime
minister appointed by president with consent of
National Assembly
election results: LEE
Myung-bak elected president on 19 December 2007;
percent of vote - LEE Myung-bak (GNP) 48.7%;
CHUNG Dong-young (UNDP) 26.1%); LEE Hoi-chang
(independent) 15.1; others 10.1%
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Legislative branch:
|
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unicameral National Assembly
or Kukhoe (299 seats; 245 members elected in
single-seat constituencies, 54 elected by
proportional representation; members serve
four-year terms)
elections: last
held on 9 April 2008 (next to be held in April
2012)
election results: percent
of vote by party - NA; seats by party - GNP 172,
UDP 83, LFP 20, PPA 8, DLP 5, RKP 1,
independents 9
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Judicial branch:
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Supreme Court (justices
appointed by the president with consent of
National Assembly); Constitutional Court
(justices appointed by the president based
partly on nominations by National Assembly and
Chief Justice of the court)
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Political parties and
leaders:
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Democratic Party or DP [CHUNG
Sye-kyun] (formerly the United Democratic Party
or UDP); Democratic Labor Party or DLP [KANG
Ki-kap]; Grand National Party or GNP [AHN Sang-soo];
Liberty Forward Party or LFP [LEE Hoi-chang];
New Progressive Party or NPP [ROH Hoe-chan];
Pro-Park Alliance or PPA [SUH Choung-won];
Renewal Korea Party or RKP [SONG Yong-o]
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Political pressure groups
and leaders:
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Federation of Korean
Industries; Federation of Korean Trade Unions;
Korean Confederation of Trade Unions; Korean
National Council of Churches; Korean Traders
Association; Korean Veterans' Association;
National Council of Labor Unions; National
Democratic Alliance of Korea; National
Federation of Farmers' Associations; National
Federation of Student Associations
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International organization
participation:
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ADB, AfDB (nonregional
member), APEC, ARF, ASEAN (dialogue partner),
Australia Group, BIS, CD, CICA, CP, EAS, EBRD,
FAO, FATF, G-20, IADB, IAEA, IBRD, ICAO, ICC,
ICCt, ICRM, IDA, IEA, IFAD, IFC, IFRCS, IHO, ILO,
IMF, IMO, IMSO, Interpol, IOC, IOM, IPU, ISO,
ITSO, ITU, ITUC, LAIA (observer), MIGA, MINURSO,
NEA, NSG, OAS (observer), OECD, OPCW, OSCE
(partner), Paris Club (associate), PCA, PIF
(partner), SAARC (observer), UN, UNAMID, UNCTAD,
UNESCO, UNHCR, UNIDO, UNIFIL, UNMIL, UNMOGIP,
UNOCI, UNWTO, UPU, WCO, WHO, WIPO, WMO, WTO, ZC
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Diplomatic representation
in the US:
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chief of mission: Ambassador
HAN Duck-soo
chancery: 2450
Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20008
telephone: [1]
(202) 939-5600
FAX: [1]
(202) 387-0205
consulate(s) general: Agana
(Guam), Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Honolulu,
Houston, Los Angeles, New York, San Francisco,
Seattle
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Diplomatic representation
from the US:
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chief of mission: Ambassador
Kathleen STEPHENS
embassy: 32
Sejongno, Jongno-gu, Seoul 110-710
mailing address: US
Embassy Seoul, APO AP 96205-5550
telephone: [82]
(2) 397-4114
FAX: [82]
(2) 738-8845
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Flag description:
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white with a red (top) and
blue yin-yang symbol in the center; there is a
different black trigram from the ancient I Ching
(Book of Changes) in each corner of the white
field; the Korean national flag is called
Taegukki; white is a traditional Korean color
and represents peace and purity; the blue
section represents the negative cosmic forces of
the yin, while the red symbolizes the opposite
positive forces of the yang; each trigram (kwae)
denotes one of the four universal elements,
which together express the principle of movement
and harmony
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National anthem:
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name: "Aegukga"
(Patriotic Song)
lyrics/music: YUN
Ch'i-Ho or AN Ch'ang-Ho/AHN Eaktay
note:
adopted
1948, well known by 1910; both North Korea and
South Korea's anthems share the same name and
have a vaguely similar melody but have different
lyrics
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