When Yoon Suk Yeol was working for president, he had the word “king” written on his palm. South Koreans dismissed — and ridiculed — it as a shamanistic ritual that mirrored his want for prime authorities workplace.
However after his inauguration in Might 2022, it didn’t take lengthy for them to see an authoritarian streak in Mr. Yoon.
On brief discover, he moved the presidential workplace from the sleek Blue Home to a colorless army constructing. When he turned 63 in December 2023, his safety staff sang songs honoring him as “a president despatched from Heaven” and describing his “845,280 minutes” in workplace as far as “a time blessed.” Two months later, a university pupil who protested Mr. Yoon’s determination to chop authorities budgets for scientific analysis was gagged and dragged out by the president’s bodyguards. When journalists printed what he referred to as “fake news,” prosecutors raided their houses and newsrooms to gather proof.
Mr. Yoon stored pushing the envelope, till he made his deadly mistake: On Dec. 3, he declared martial law, threatening a deeply cherished a part of South Korean life: democracy.
To South Koreans, democracy has by no means been one thing given; it was fought for and gained via a long time of battle in opposition to authoritarian leaders at the price of torture, imprisonment and bloodshed. All the foremost political milestones in South Korea — an finish to dictatorship, the introduction of free elections, the ouster of abusive leaders — had been achieved after residents took to the streets.
So when individuals noticed troops despatched by Mr. Yoon storming the Nationwide Meeting to grab the legislature by pressure, their response was rapid. However not like those that fought authorities repression within the Fifties via the ’80s, South Koreans protesting in current months had democratic establishments on their aspect.
The present Structure, written in 1987 after an enormous pro-democracy rebellion, gave the Nationwide Meeting the ability to vote down martial legislation and impeach presidents. The Constitutional Courtroom, created underneath that Structure, received to determine whether or not to take away or reinstate an impeached president. And leaders democratically elected underneath that Structure imprisoned those that had earlier taken energy by army pressure.
Youthful generations, together with the paratroopers Mr. Yoon despatched to grab the Meeting in December, grew up studying of that historical past via box office-hit movies and novelists like the Nobel laureate Han Kang.
On Dec. 3, the troops hesitated earlier than indignant residents blocking them with naked arms, permitting time for lawmakers, together with some members of Mr. Yoon’s personal celebration, to assemble and vote to carry his martial legislation decree. The Meeting then impeached him, on Dec. 14.
And on Friday, the Constitutional Courtroom’s eight justices, together with these appointed by Mr. Yoon or his celebration, unanimously upheld that impeachment, placing an finish to his army insurrection.
To 1 observer, these occasions had been a victory for the democratic establishments created within the late Nineteen Eighties. “The response to Yoon’s tried coup d’état displayed the maturity of Korean democracy — to start with, the resilience of civil society, which reacted instantly and massively to oppose the coup, most notably with the fervour of Korean youth who weren’t alive within the Nineteen Eighties and skilled the hazards of a return to autocratic rule for the primary time,” mentioned Daniel Sneider, a former journalist who lined South Korea again then and is now a lecturer at Stanford College.
“The truth that it was a unanimous determination of the Constitutional Courtroom, with conservative appointees becoming a member of the choice, was an important expression of not solely the readability of the case, but additionally the power to beat ideological polarization,” Mr. Sneider mentioned.
Mr. Yoon’s energy seize additionally uncovered the vulnerabilities of democracy in South Korea. If such a factor can occur in a nation lengthy thought-about an exemplary case of democratization in Asia, scholars warned, it might occur elsewhere, too.
Regardless of his elimination, the deep polarization that led as much as Mr. Yoon’s declaration of martial legislation persists. The partisan battle between the left and proper is prone to intensify within the subsequent two months because the nation lurches towards a presidential election.
However the previous 4 months have additionally proven the resilience of South Korean democracy.
Till Mr. Yoon got here alongside, few South Koreans thought {that a} return to army rule was doable of their nation, a peaceable democracy identified globally for its automobiles, smartphones and Okay-dramas. A lot of those that joined protests calling for Mr. Yoon’s ouster in current weeks mentioned that they had been extra happy with their democracy than of their cultural exports just like the boy band BTS or the Netflix hit “Squid Recreation.”
When Mr. Yoon damage that pleasure, he picked a combat he couldn’t win. Throughout rallies, individuals shared a video clip of former President Kim Dae-jung, an iconic determine in South Korea’s democratization battle.
“Democracy shouldn’t be free,” Mr. Kim mentioned in the clip. “It’s essential to shed blood, sweat and tears for it.”
If the Constitutional Courtroom had voted to reinstate Mr. Yoon, South Korea would have seen a “second wave of democratization motion” and “a second Gwangju,” mentioned Cho Gab-je, a outstanding South Korean journalist who has lined the nation’s political evolution since 1971, referring to the brutally suppressed rebellion in opposition to martial legislation in the southern city of Gwangju in 1980.
“We had our share of martial legislation, however Yoon Suk Yeol was the primary president to ship armed troops into Parliament,” Mr. Cho mentioned.
Mr. Yoon was as soon as a hero amongst South Koreans. He constructed his nationwide picture as an uncompromising prosecutor when he helped imprison two former presidents for corruption. However he proved disastrous as a politician — unable to have interaction within the give and take of compromise with the opposition, which managed the Nationwide Meeting.
He was accused of filling his presidential workers with officers too timid to talk up. He was nicknamed “Mr. 59 Minutes,” as a result of that was how lengthy he was mentioned to talk throughout an hourlong assembly. He not often apologized for his wife’s scandals and even for deadly disasters. He used his veto energy to kill opposition payments. The opposition slashed his budgets and impeached an unprecedented variety of political appointees in his authorities.
“A participant busy taking part in on the sector doesn’t have a look at the digital scoreboard,” Mr. Yoon as soon as mentioned when requested about his dismal approval scores.
Such an perspective allowed him to push unpopular efforts, reminiscent of improving ties with Japan and drastically increasing the variety of docs. However even many who sympathized along with his battle in opposition to the opposition didn’t see martial legislation coming.
“Koreans are not looking for the Nineteen Eighties choice, when martial legislation and tear gasoline made forcibly disappeared individuals painful to so many households,” mentioned Alexis Dudden, a professor of historical past on the College of Connecticut. “Yoon and his advisers missed the mark of studying right this moment’s South Korea in lots of apparent methods.”
