[Square] The Challenge Posed by 'Appa Chance' Regardless of Left or Right

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As Jeong Ho-young, the nominee for Minister of Health and Welfare, became embroiled in a ‘child controversy,’ President Yoon Seok-yeol’s transition team found itself facing a ‘double standard’ controversy right from the start. It appears that the roles have reversed from the child controversy involving former Minister of Justice Cho Kuk. The so-called ‘Cho Kuk incident’ caused a massive rift in the approval ratings of the Moon Jae-in administration and ultimately had a significant impact on the regime change, making this a noteworthy development.

In fact, the traditional conservative-progressive divide had already become blurred. The previous conservative administration under Park Geun-hye was collapsing not only due to moral issues such as the state affairs manipulation scandal but also because of perceptions of ‘incompetence.’ On the other hand, the Cho Kuk incident raised the question in Korean society of whether progressives are indeed more moral than conservatives. As a result, the confrontation seen in the last presidential election took on a curious form, with conservatives emphasizing morality and progressives emphasizing competence. This current conservative administration is unique in that it has prioritized morality over competence.

The easiest way to attack a ‘morality-based’ administration is to criticize those who emphasize morality as being hypocritical. This was clearly evident during the Moon Jae-in administration. Conservatives did not criticize progressives for incompetence but for immorality. In such a context, criticizing the immorality and inconsistency of conservatives using Jeong Ho-young as a pretext becomes a straightforward strategy for the Democratic Party. Progressives have no response when asked, “You shook things up so much with former Minister Cho Kuk, so why are conservatives trying to let this slide?”

Watching the exchange of moral high ground between progressives and conservatives is not a pleasant experience. The ‘privilege’ controversies over the past decade have starkly revealed how much the upper class or upper-middle class in Korean society is obsessed with reproducing their social status. Of course, a perfectly ‘fair’ society is an ideal that may only exist in theory, so dissatisfaction with the current imperfect state is understandable. However, what makes people bitter is the seemingly irreversible widening of class disparities, the differing opportunities afforded to each class, and ultimately the complete division in perceptions and experiences. The once equal-opportunity land of Korea is gradually disappearing, replaced by hereditary strongholds of varying heights filling the country.

What is needed to at least minimize this bitterness? Assuming basic legal and moral conditions are met, what is truly necessary is vision and competence rather than morality. The emergence and intergenerational inheritance of class and inequality in an egalitarian society is a recurring theme throughout human history. The only way to overturn this has been through catastrophic social crises. Since we cannot endure such destructive crises, our options are limited. What we can hope for is a vision that rekindles the hope of social upward mobility achievable through effort for the least advantaged, and the competence to implement it. After all, isn’t one of the primary purposes of democracy to elect a ‘capable government’?

The Moon Jae-in administration found itself in trouble, failing to inspire trust in competence due to the failure of income-led growth and being attacked on its greatest asset, morality. If the new government, which has begun to face moral criticism from the MZ generation over the ‘dad-chance’ controversy involving a ministerial nominee’s child, fails to regain trust in vision and competence, it risks repeating the mistakes of the previous administration.

How can new vitality be injected into Korea, a land marked by polarization and inequality? Preparing answers to this question may be as much an obligation for the new government as discovering talent that meets personnel screening standards.

Im Myeong-muk, Writer

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