[The Editors' Verdict]Presidential Election Fails to Inspire the Center

[Asia Economy Reporter Choi Il-kwon] The marathon of the 20th presidential election has reached its final stage. After each party’s primaries in October and November last year, the candidates have been racing breathlessly, and by the night of the 9th, we will know who the next president will be.

The biggest event in the presidential election process was undoubtedly the candidate unification. Lee Jae-myung, the Democratic Party candidate, introduced the idea of a unified government and reached out to minor party candidates, forming an alliance with Kim Dong-yeon of the New Wave party. Yoon Seok-youl, the People Power Party candidate, gained attention by dramatically achieving unification with Ahn Cheol-soo of the People’s Party, who had been fading away. He even took a step further by proposing party-to-party integration.

However, despite the possibility of a big tent in the ruling party and the opposition’s successful candidate unification, neither the Democratic Party nor the People Power Party is optimistic about victory. Although the election is just a day away, they have not been able to sufficiently draw out the support of the centrist voters who have yet to declare their preference. One reason the early voting rates in Gyeonggi and Chungnam regions during the advance voting on the 4th and 5th were lower than the national average seems related to this. Unification can attract voter support beyond simply adding the two candidates’ approval ratings, and conversely, failing to unify can lead to worse results than not unifying at all. The political world does not accept the calculation of ‘1+1=2.’

The muted response from the centrist voters is because the efforts by both party candidates to embrace other factions failed to inspire. It was merely a coalition among politically similar groups, which did not capture the interest of those who determine the election’s outcome.

The People Power Party and the People’s Party, which chose unification and merger, have similar political spectrums. Looking at the full party platforms, the People Power Party’s platform explicitly mentions the ‘Saemaul Undong’ and the ‘Miracle on the Han River,’ which are absent from the Democratic Party’s platform. Both Lee Jae-myung and Kim Dong-yeon visited the National May 18 Democratic Cemetery last year and shared the act of stepping on the monument of Chun Doo-hwan. Ultimately, the candidates’ moves toward integration and unification can be seen as merely consolidations within their respective factions.

The power of unification is confirmed when crossing political camps. Former President Kim Dae-jung, during his 1992 presidential run, successfully formed a policy alliance with the National Alliance for Democracy and Unification, a representative of the dissident political forces. He joined hands with a politically similar group. However, in that election, he lost to Kim Young-sam of the Democratic Liberal Party by about 1.94 million votes. Five years later, he reversed course by allying with Kim Jong-pil, leader of the conservative United Liberal Democrats, gaining about 2 million more votes than in the previous election and securing the presidency. Kim Jong-in, former chief of the People Power Party’s election committee, recently stated in his book “Why Presidents Fail” that “the essence of integration is not about merging and splitting among themselves but about encompassing the center,” adding, “If that is done well, conservative and progressive integration will naturally follow.” This means that crossing political lines and joining hands can create greater synergy.

A presidential election without a clear theme also failed to attract the centrist voters’ interest. Both leading candidates focused on micro-targeted pledges aimed at specific groups, failing to present a big picture properly. Former President Park Geun-hye, ahead of the 2007 presidential primaries, emphasized ‘Julpoose (cut taxes, deregulate, and establish law and order),’ but later presented themes such as building a welfare state and economic democratization, winning the 2012 presidential election. In particular, economic democratization was evaluated as a sign that the conservative party had adopted a reformist stance, regardless of whether it was realized after taking office.

The failure to properly embrace the centrist voters largely stems from concerns about contradictions between support bases and policies or lines. Politics is a continuous process of adjusting contradictory relationships. It is regrettable that the candidates did not demonstrate such capabilities.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.