By Andy Jackson
Dear Mr. Roh,
While there have been no shortages of open letters to President Lee Myung-bak, I would like to take a moment to write one to you.
After five years of being at the center of Korean public life, you must be feeling a little lost and lonely right now.
Your presidency started with great promise and enthusiasm. Your unlikely story, a self-educated-lawyer-turned-human rights champion, who wins the presidency shortly after losing a legislative race, had great appeal.
You had strong support from many Koreans at the beginning of your term, especially from those under forty. Your fan club, Nosamo, counted rock stars and other celebrities among its members.
What a change five years have made! Now you are going out as one of the least popular presidents in Korean history, not an easy feat. In a recent opinion poll, only 21 percent of respondents approved of your performance as president. You have even been disowned by the members of your own party.
Your term has not been without its accomplishments.
You built on economic reforms started by presidents Kim Young-sam and Kim Dae-jung. Business in Korea today is conducted more transparently than it was five years ago.
Although your term has been called part of an economic ``lost decade,'' the 3 percent to 4 percent growth rate achieved during most of that time is considered respectable for a country at Korea's level of development.
Your reputation for personal integrity is intact. You do not face any serious charges of malfeasance.
However, you have been criticized, and rightly so, for your often inept management of the administration and for seemingly being out of your depth on a number of issues.
You restricted development, including housing, in the growing city of Seoul as part of your balanced regional development plan. Then you seemed genuinely surprised when the resulting imbalance in supply and demand contributed to a rapid rise in real estate prices.
Despite your best intentions, you managed to surround yourself with the incompetent and the corrupt. The ongoing investigation of former Budget and Planning Minister Byeon Yang-kyoon's sex and corruption affair is just the tawdriest of the scandals that plagued your presidency. You must still regret the faith you put in Chung Dong-young for so long even as he showed time and again his ineffectiveness as a political leader.
Korea's progressive camp is still dealing with the split from the old Millennium Democratic Party you instigated in 2003. The pieces have almost been put together again with the recent merger of the United New Democratic and Democratic parties, but it may be too late to avert disaster in April's National Assembly elections.
Your 2005 proposal to form a ``grand coalition" with the conservative Grand National Party was, to put it mildly, strange.
I could go on, but I trust you get the point.
Now that you have some free time on your hands, you can begin the task of trying to shape your legacy. You can do that both by influencing the discussion of your presidency and through your actions after it.
Korea has not been kind to its former presidents, with the somewhat dubious exception of Park Chung-hee (Kim Dae-jung is still popular in Honam), but you can look to former American president Jimmy Carter for some comfort.
Like you, Carter left office burdened with the legacy of being seen as a decent man who was in well over his head.
After losing his reelection campaign in 1980, he built on that image of decency. He helped build houses for poor people. He observed elections. He went on peace missions (famously meeting Kim Il-sung in 1994) and even won himself a Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.
Carter will never completely erase the memory of his failed presidency, but his conduct afterwards makes that legacy more palatable.
There are lessons to be learned from both the Carter and Nixon examples.
Build bridges with progressives who were disappointed by your presidency. Don't worry about conservatives, as they will not change their view of you.
You should also work with charity groups and civic organizations. Campaign for civil rights and transparency in corporate governance. Remind people why they voted for you.
One policy area in which you still have influence is North Korea, where your record is hopefully ambivalent.
While it is true that there are just as many North Korean troops across the DMZ as there were when you took office and Pyongyang has increased its nuclear weapons and missile capabilities, they have been gracious in accepting South Korean aid in the form of the Gaeseong Industrial Complex and allowed you to visit Pyongyang last fall.
In the normal ebb and flow of the inter-Korean relationship there will inevitably be times when feelings sour. In those times, you may have a chance to act as mediator between Seoul and Pyongyang. At the very least, reporters will once again seek out your opinion.
At 62 years old, you still have a lot of life ahead of you. Enjoy your newfound freedom for a while, and then get back to work.
Andy Jackson teaches American government in the Lakeland College bridge program at Ansan College, Gyeonggi Province. He can be reached at andyinrok@lycos.com