The aborted Park regime?

In 1963, 2 years after having organized a coup that placed him in power and under pressure from Kennedy to organize an election, Park Chung-hee was officially elected president of South Korea, defeating former Seoul mayor and head of state Yun Bo-seon by less than 2% of the votes. He would continue to lead as dictator until his assassination in 1979. WI Yun had won? For starters, would Park acknowledge his defeat?
 
An aborted Park regime might have some undesirable effects. Though he was a dictator, he is also considered (with admiration by some and begrudgingly by others) as the father of the modern South Korean economy.

I've got some books on the subject at home, so I'll look into it a bit more there. What I suspect is that this could have a negative effect on South Korean modernisation. One obvious effect would be that South Korea's highspeed freeway network might never be built, as it was constructed with significant opposition.
 
One thing that is important to remember with Korean politics is it is often driven by the parochial conflict between the southeast Gyeongsang region and the southwest Jeolla region. Gyeongsang produced dictators, chaebols and high economic growth, with Jeolla produced democracy advocates. Even today, the base for the conservative movement in Korea is based in Gyeongsang, with the progressive movement based in Jeolla. Yun Boseon founded the Democratic party, which means his power base is probably in the Jeolla region.

The recent Roh Moohyun administration was also a rare victory for the Jeolla region but it was largely a failure due to obstructionism from Gyeongsang region. It is possibly that a similar scenario would play out with Yun Boseon, but much earlier in history.
 
One thing that is important to remember with Korean politics is it is often driven by the parochial conflict between the southeast Gyeongsang region and the southwest Jeolla region. Gyeongsang produced dictators, chaebols and high economic growth, with Jeolla produced democracy advocates. Even today, the base for the conservative movement in Korea is based in Gyeongsang, with the progressive movement based in Jeolla. Yun Boseon founded the Democratic party, which means his power base is probably in the Jeolla region.

The recent Roh Moohyun administration was also a rare victory for the Jeolla region but it was largely a failure due to obstructionism from Gyeongsang region. It is possibly that a similar scenario would play out with Yun Boseon, but much earlier in history.
That's interesting. Are there demographic divisions (IE wealth distribution or certain religions) causing the political split between these two regions? Or is it traditional politics, similar to the Deep South v. the Northeast, or the South Shore vs the People's Republic of Cambridge ?
 

Goldstein

Banned
One thing that is important to remember with Korean politics is it is often driven by the parochial conflict between the southeast Gyeongsang region and the southwest Jeolla region. Gyeongsang produced dictators, chaebols and high economic growth, with Jeolla produced democracy advocates. Even today, the base for the conservative movement in Korea is based in Gyeongsang, with the progressive movement based in Jeolla. Yun Boseon founded the Democratic party, which means his power base is probably in the Jeolla region.

The recent Roh Moohyun administration was also a rare victory for the Jeolla region but it was largely a failure due to obstructionism from Gyeongsang region. It is possibly that a similar scenario would play out with Yun Boseon, but much earlier in history.


Very interesting indeed. That makes me think about the possibilities of a tripartite Korea, i.e. Communist north, right-wing authoritarian east, progressive democratic west. Is that scenario possible?
 
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