The outcome still leaves the opposition Grand National Party with a thin plurality in the National Assembly. Yet Kim’s triumph is apparent. The stunning summit announcement was welcomed by most South Koreans, and certainly altered the outcome of the election. In a public-opinion survey last week, 90 percent of South Koreans welcomed the announcement. “Had it not been for the summit, the ruling party would have failed to increase its support base,” says Choi Jang Jip, a political scientist at Korea University. Peace is still fragile, but even the hint of a rapprochement will ease military tensions. Chosun Ilbo, a Seoul daily, heralded the summit, which it said “could resolve the Cold War structure on the Korean peninsula, the last Cold War region in the world.”
In particular, prewar Koreans were heartened by the news. They hope that the summit will lead to reunions with family members left in the North decades ago. During 55 years of division, the Koreas have permitted only one reunion effort, in 1985, and that involved only 100 families. In the same survey, nearly half the respondents said that the reunion issue should be at the top of the summit agenda. South Korea’s young people are less sentimental. Although they welcome the summit idea, they don’t want to see a sudden national reunification that, as happened in Germany, could prove to be costly. “When I was in high school, I yearned for quick reunification,” said Lee Hye Mi, 29, a graduate student. “But now I think we can wait a bit longer if the cost is too high.” Kim’s party reaped gains among thirtysomething voters near Seoul, and got a major boost from Kangwon, a province bordering North Korea where thousands of families divided during the war welcome his campaign for greater inter-Korean contact.
Kim’s critics had tried to play on South Koreans’ fears during the campaign. They bashed Kim’s “sunshine policy” of engagement with the North, calling the effort a “one-sided love affair” and a waste of tax money. When the summit accord was announced, however, they hastily shifted tactics. In a statement, the GNP declared that “no regime in history has turned to such a blunt and shameless trick to win an election.” Across the country, voters tuned out the bickering. Youthful candidates, backed by progressive civic groups, took seats from older opponents relying on traditional regional rivalries. The coming of age of this new generation decimated South Korea’s stodgiest political party, the United Liberal Democrats. The ULD’s stable of musty candidates spouted anticommunist rhetoric from the 1960s. The result: the ULD lost more than two thirds of its seats, leaving the once powerful party a tiny 17-member beachhead in the assembly.
Kim had hoped that his summit surprise would give the ruling party a plurality in the assembly. Although the results fell somewhat shy of that target, political analysts say he will enjoy greater support for his peace initiative than he had prior to the vote. Nobody is getting giddy yet, of course. South Koreans recall that previous peace overtures, including reconciliation accords in 1974 and 1992, were quickly followed by renewed hostilities. But these days, the strongest winds are favorable–and blowing from the South.
