Conservative zealots: Evangelical politics in South Korea

10 July 2023

Protestants are the largest religious group in South Korea (making up about 20 per cent) and have an impressive heritage. They contributed to Korea’s independence movement against the Japanese empire, nation-building, economic development, and democratisation in modern history. They were in the same boat as all other Korean people in the middle of the political turmoil of the last century, though some debate whether their contributions to society were more positive or negative. Among a variety of religious groups, it is especially South Korean conservative evangelical Protestants that have actively participated in party politics since the early 2000s. They represent a powerful conservative group in South Korea that exerts significant influence on society and politics. But established conservative parties like the People Power Party have struggled to fully draw on them for support, as conservative evangelicals still prefer to back their own parties. However, conservative parties are closely eyeing conservative evangelicals and working to gather their support, as the group holds the potential to shift the balance in South Korean politics.

Evangelicals meet liberal governments

Conservative Protestants were closely connected with the authoritarian and dictatorial governments before South Korea’s democratic transition. For their support of the Rhee Syngman and the Park Chung-Hee governments, they gained economic benefits and legal privileges. For a decade after South Korea’s democratisation in 1987, major conservative parties continued to win presidential elections and controlled the government. However, at the turn of the century, conservative Protestants suddenly faced a liberal government, something they did not experience before 1997.

This shift in South Korea’s political landscape led to a pivotal moment in religious politics, as conservative evangelicals directly involved themselves in the New Right Movement in 2004. Conservative evangelicals understood the emergence of liberal governments as a real threat to the ‘fatherland’ as well as Christians overall. They claimed that liberals were supporters of North Korean communism and anti-Christian. As a result, the religious group directly joined party politics to counter liberal and leftwing political groups. In the early 2000s, Cho Yonggi, Kim Joon-Gon, Kim Hong-Do, Kim Jin-Hong, Choi Byung-Doo, Shin Hyun-Kyun, Kim Jang-Hwan, and other prominent conservative Protestant pastors and leaders initiated a political evangelical movement, with the Christian Council of Korea and the New Right Union becoming their main organisations.

The critical conundrum for the political success of conservative evangelicals nowadays lies in the uncertainty of the relationship between evangelicals and the established conservative parties.

In terms of the evangelicals' political participation, there were two different strategies. The first was to support the existing conservative parties and thereby influence governmental policies. Evangelicals can provide conservative parties with sizable vote gains in presidential and other elections. For instance, conservative Christians were a remarkable voting bloc for successful conservative presidential candidates: 58.14 per cent of Protestants voted for Lee Myung-bak in 2007 and 50.97 per cent voted for Park Geun-hye in 2012.

The second strategy of political participation was to form evangelical political parties, and indeed, charismatic leaders of megachurches have founded several Christian political parties since 2004. They expected Christian parties to become major political parties in South Korea, betting on the Protestant population’s support during elections. They also anticipated that the 2004 electoral reform, which partially adopted a proportional representation (PR) system in distributing congressional seats, would help the parties to win congressional seats. However, their strategy turned out to be unsuccessful. The Christian Liberal Party (CLP) only gained 2.64 per cent of the PR votes in the 2016 legislative election, and other Christian parties fared worse. Until now, conservative evangelicals have had more success supporting existing conservative parties than establishing their own parties.

Conservative evangelicals' ideology and main issues

The ideology of conservative evangelicals is strongly anti-communist at its core. The group regularly labels people who criticise conservativism or conservative policies as pro-North Korean communists and antichrists. They use this narrative to oppose liberal or leftwing parties, claiming that these parties would lead the country towards communism. Overall, this ideology is more prevalent in older than younger generations.

In terms of international relations, they support a triangular alliance with the United States and Japan to counter security threats from North Korea and China. Based on this foreign policy stance, the group wants to nullify engagement policies aimed at reducing tensions and the potential for conflict between the two Koreas, as they claim that these policies just provide North Korea with the chance to strengthen its communist regime.

The economic policies conservative evangelicals support are mainly related to church organisations: They oppose an income tax for religious leaders and favour low-interest rates on church loans. The wealth and economic assets of religious groups have rapidly grown together with Korea’s economy, with some organisations and individuals amassing immense fortunes. But until recently, Christian pastors as well as Catholic clergies and Buddhist monks were not required to pay an income tax. When the government imposed an income tax on religious leaders in 2018, conservative evangelicals strongly resisted the new tax policy, arguing that it was an insult to pastors as they are not workers. These special exceptions provided to religious groups are critical in protecting the megachurches' economic interests, and megachurch pastors who are concerned about economic issues are often at the forefront of conservative evangelical political activism.

Other agendas include anti-LGBTQ+ and anti-Islamic talking points, which are part of a perceived culture war that conservative evangelicals have been publicising since the mid-2010s. An example is their blaming LGBTQ+ communities for spreading the virus during the Covid-19 pandemic, even as many conservative evangelicals themselves did not accept the government’s restrictions that temporarily prohibited worship, religious services, and other group gatherings. They asserted that the restrictions were a violation of their religious freedom. Furthermore, they believe that South Korea is geopolitically on the frontline of the culture war between different religions and cultures and has a responsibility to protect the Christian world against Islam or LGBTQ+ persons.

Apart from issue politics, conservative evangelicals have also had a considerable impact on social movements. They were one of the main political groups who actively participated in the Taegukgi movements in 2016, the conservative anti-impeachment rallies in support of then-President Park Geun-hye. A survey in 2019 showed that even 13.4 per cent of Protestants supported an evangelical impeachment rally against liberal then-President Moon Jae-in. This relatively high number was surprising because the general populace had little interest in the rally at the time.

Together or separate? Possible scenarios for evangelical politics

The critical conundrum for the political success of conservative evangelicals nowadays lies in the uncertainty of the relationship between evangelicals and the established conservative parties. If they were to cooperate more effectively, they could strengthen their political power and likely gain an edge against leftwing groups and parties. Even though conservative parties have won elections and led several governments since 1987, they are still weakly institutionalised. The parties have not successfully developed the means to reliably mobilise supporters and recruit political elites and experts. In this vein, it might be understandable why some presidents have relied on their private networks or even shamanists in making policy decisions because political parties were not doing enough to form a coherent policy course for governments to adhere to. Conservative parties need religious groups and organisations; but, on the other hand, the parties often hesitate to coalesce with conservative evangelicals. They worry about losing the support of moderate conservatives if they have too close of a relationship with evangelical groups. On the other side, conservative evangelicals complain that conservative parties do not fully represent their policies and ideological positions, leaving little space for compromise.

How then will the relationship between evangelicals and conservative parties develop from here on? Four different scenarios are imaginable. First, as they already did, conservative evangelicals could continue trying to create their own congressional party in the National Assembly, directly competing for votes with the established conservative parties. This strategy might be successful if they effectively mobilise moderate conservatives as well as strong conservative Christian voters. Evidence for this scenario can be found with the Liberty Unification Party, the Christian conservative party founded in 2020, which is likely to field its candidates in the upcoming 2024 legislative election, despite its failures in the past.

Second, they might join an existing conservative party. Conservative evangelical leaders founded their own parties to win elections, but it was not easy to also gain congressional seats. It might be most practical for them to become a major faction in a conservative party, enacting influence from within instead of competing for votes and congressional seats. Third, they might want to be a religious interest group that is closely associated with a conservative party and connected social movements, but which does not directly participate in party politics. The fourth scenario would be a combination of all the above, where conservative evangelist groups split in their political engagement, with some founding their own party, others joining conservative parties, and still others staying out of politics altogether. The 2024 election will likely be a crucial tipping point in the political fortune of Korea’s conservative evangelicals.

Lastly, another serious challenge for evangelical politics will be the changes in leadership that are inevitably coming, as most conservative evangelical leaders today are at an advanced age or have already passed away. As a new generation enters politics, conservative evangelical groups will have to sort out their leadership. Without the charismatic pastors and leaders of the last generation, it will be hard to mobilise their supporters. In any case, the ruling conservative People Power Party as well as other political parties are paying attention to conservative evangelicals' political strategies because they are an important political group that can make a difference in Korean politics in the future.

DISCLAIMER: All views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent that of the 9DASHLINE.com platform.

Author biography

Dr Yong Jae Kim is an Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Studies at Hawaii Pacific University and a Research Fellow at Pacific Forum. His research interests are East Asian politics and foreign policy. His papers were published in Asian Survey; Government and Opposition; and Asian Politics and Policy. Dr Kim is currently writing about the Chinese Communist Party's political strategy and North Korean Nuclear Crisis.

He wants to express his gratitude to Eva Seiwert, Benedikt Staar, and Soojin Song for their assistance with this article. Image credit: Unsplash/Andrea De Santis (cropped).