Less Polarized but Disaffected Political Parties in Korea (シンポジウム報告)

which means the continuation of conservative dominance in Korean politics after the Lee Myong Bak regime.However, the victory of Park was not a natural outgrowth of conservative dominance among the electorate.Korean politics, unlike Japanese politics, has long been characterized by virtual two party competition between conservative and progressive camp.After ten years of ruling by the liberal Kim Dae Jung and Roh Mu Hyun regimes between 1998 and 2007, conservative Saenuri Party grasped power from 2008.Another conservative politician, Park Geun Hye, could secure political power in the presidential election in 2012.However, pundits say that Korean presidential election ends up with almost 51 to 49 ratio in the end.The election of Park was not an exception.One can hardly expect a landslide election by one camp.Exceptional presidential election outcome was that of 2007, where Lee Myong Bak won over opposition candidate by more than five million votes.Personal dislike against Roh led to this surprising outcome.However, the victory of Park was never a easily-expected outcome.Park took a very strategic political move to attract new layers of voters while consolidating existing conservative voters.First of all, though Park and Lee belonged to the same party, Park always tried to differentiate herself from Lee Myong Bak regime and kept arms-length distance from