On April 15, the Uri Party -- which supports the impeached President Roh Moo-hyun -- defeated the long-dominant Grand National Party (GNP) by winning 152 of the 299 seats in South Korea's National Assembly election. This has stabilized the ties between South Korea's leader and its parliament.
Many believe that Roh and President Chen Shui-bian (
Their opponents both served past authoritarian governments and have enjoyed parliamentary majorities for a long time. That GNP Chairwoman Park Geun-hye is the daughter of late president Park Chung-hee also has meaning for many Koreans.
Roh's support ratings were not high due to his poor performance in office. However, the GNP voted to impeach him for violating a minor election law, and his fate will be decided by a Constitutional Court ruling on the impeachment vote. This led to both voter sympathy for him and anger against the GNP, and therefore significantly affected the election results.
This is somewhat similar to the shooting of Chen the day before the presidential election, which may have attracted sympathy votes and influenced the election's atmosphere.
Moreover, student movements exist in both nations. Some of these students became politicized in protests against authoritarian governments of the past, but have since become members of the current presidents' administrative teams.
There's also a common factor of geographic politics. South Korea's forces tend to be divided between the eastern and western parts of the nation. Similarly, a gap be-tween northern and southern Taiwan has also frequently been evident in election returns, and the latest election even polarized society as a whole.
Just like Taiwan's China policy, Seoul's foreign relations hinge on its North Korea policy. South Korea has constantly softened its North Korea policy since its democratization. This tendency was especially obvious during the presidency of Kim Dae-jung, who actively promoted a "sunshine policy" regarding this issue. This is quite different from past regimes controlled by leaders with military backgrounds.
From former president Lee Teng-hui's (
So while the new political generation represented by Kim and Roh softened South Korea's policies toward its northern neighbor, the new political force spearheaded by Lee and Chen prompted Taiwan to stand up against Beijing.
So in this respect, the otherwise quite similar pro-democracy leaders of South Korea and Taiwan are leading their countries in opposite directions. Most interestingly, the same groundswell of nationalism accounts for the two opposite trends. While Korean nationalism fuels South Korea's moves toward cooperation with Pyongyang, a growing Taiwanese identity influences Taipei's China policies.
Both Taiwan and South Korea lean heavily on the US for military protection. However, the changes in these policies in Taiwan and South Korea have caused problems in the countries' relations with the US.
In South Korea, Kim and Roh disagree with the Bush administrations' hardline approach toward Pyongyang, and this difference has markedly harmed South Korean-US relations. In Taiwan, Lee and Chen have not sought US counsel before repeatedly testing Beijing's threats of military force. These abrupt moves disrupted the strategic balance between the US and China and dealt Washington another headache.
To sum up, after its pro-democracy forces gained power, South Korea turned overly soft toward North Korea. And since Taiwan's new political generation took office, the nation's leaders have been excessively provocative toward China.
Both trends have influenced the two countries' relations with the US. Washington watched the elections in Taiwan and South Korea with fears of ever more unpredictable and uncontrollable diplomatic situations.
If the surge of domestic nationalism is the structural factor that has changed Taiwan's policy on China and South Korea's Pyongyang policy, then why are there are such differing results from Taiwan's local consciousness and South Korea's nationalism?
We have seen Pyong-yang show support for Roh and the Uri Party that helped the latter in the National Assembly elec-tions. Beijing had also revealed a clear pro-blue slant during Tai-wan's presidential election, but the blue camp has shunned this undesired favor.
Citing the nations' different historical contexts and cultural conditions, many analysts say different national sentiments are only natural. Nevertheless, there is another structural factor worth noting: South Korea holds the upper hand in military and economic power, and therefore its nationalism demands an advance to the North. Taiwan is in an inferior position, and therefore its local consciousness seeks a di-vorce from China. In the different choices for friendly advances or divorce we see the different power dynamics behind the two troubled relationships.
Wu Yu-shan directs the preparatory office of Academia Sinica's Institute of Political Science.
TRANSLATED BY EDDY CHANG AND WANG HSIAO-WEN
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