Parliamentary system and economy

By Jay Kim

Recently, the issue of amending the constitution has been in full discussion in South Korean politics. There are reports that 37 members of the National Assembly have already formed a group to pursue constitutional reforms for the decentralization of power; 14 members of the group belong to the majority Saenuri Party, and 23 of them to the minority Democratic United Party. Their intention to reform the Constitution by working together with the other side in order to improve the lives of people deserves our appreciation.

I do not know the specific content of the constitutional reforms they pursue, but there are two key issues in discussion. One issue is that a parliamentary system like Japan’s should be adopted because the current presidential system has too many problems. The other key issue is whether a term limit structure like the U.S. has, which allows a president two terms of four years, should be implemented. The reform group claims that, lest the reforms should place a burden on the new administration, it is better for the National Assembly to form a special committee for constitutional reforms and finish the reforms in the first half of this year.

However, it is difficult to understand why members of the National Assembly should gather to change the Constitution in such a hurry at this delicate time before the launch of a new administration, especially considering that the economy has gotten bad for ordinary people and there is an urgent national security issue concerning North Korea. I do not believe that people will support politicians putting all their energy into constitutional reform during the first half of this year.

The Constitution of the Republic of Korea is more concrete and substantial in its content than the U.S. Constitution. For example, the Korean Constitution lists the 28 rights of its people in detail in Article II, while the U.S. Constitution contains only 10 basic rights, and only within the amendments to the Constitution, not the main body of the text. The Korean Constitution has been amended nine times over the 65 years since its adoption in 1948. The current constitution is the result of the most recent amendment, ratified in 1987.

Though I respect the drive to amend the Constitution that had been refined over a long period of time, the current process seems to be overly rushed. To amend the Constitution, several public hearings should be held and people’s opinions should be heard as well. An amendment to the Constitution typically takes two years, because they go through this process.

Most worrisome is the proposal to adopt a parliamentary system. Once the president is directly elected by the people after a long and difficult verification process, granting the president a five-year term provides stability. The frequent changes of power in a parliamentary system will make businesses feel uneasy because of unpredictable policies. This lack of continuity will hold back economic development.

Let’s look at our neighbor, Japan. For 66 years since its Constitution was adopted in 1947, the government was dissolved 50 times by a non-confidence vote by the Lower House, and the average term of a prime minister has been just 15 months. The nation has voted practically every year. After the victory of the Liberal Democratic Party in the election held on Dec. 26 last year, a new cabinet was formed with Shinzo Abe as prime minister. Abe had been the prime minister for a year, from September 2006 to September 2007, until his cabinet also was dissolved by the non-confidence vote. He came back after six years, but it remains to be seen how long he will stay this time. In Japanese history, four prime ministers resigned within less than two months due to a non-confidence vote.

According to a recent poll in Japan, only 15 percent of the Japanese people are satisfied with the current parliamentary system. Support for the two major parties, the Democratic Party and the Liberal Democratic Party, are just 12 percent and 18 percent, respectively. An overwhelming number of the Japanese are disillusioned by their parliamentary system and prefer a stable U.S.-style presidential system that keeps a president in the office until the end of a term. Furthermore, it has also been reported that there is a movement by the citizens to get rid of the parliamentary system.

There was a time when a parliamentary system was adopted in Korea. Through the third amendment in 1960, a parliamentary system was adopted only to fail, and the current system of five-year, one-term presidency was adopted through the ninth amendments in 1986.

The U.S. Constitution was adopted in 1787, and its presidential system has been a success for the past 226 years. The overwhelming majority of the American people are satisfied with the current presidential system. During those 226 years, a parliamentary system has never been proposed. In the U.S., a president is guaranteed for the first four years, once elected after a long and difficult test by the people. The American people elected President Obama again, believing his promise that he will revive the economy if they give him four more years. It is not an exaggeration to say that the presidential system made the U.S. the most powerful country in the world, while the parliamentary system is crashing the Japanese economy.

Jay Kim is a former U.S. congressman. He serves as chairman of the Kim Chang Joon US-Korea Foundation. For more information, visit Kim’s website at www.jayckim.com.