On December 3, 2024, at 10:30 p.m. Korean Standard Time, Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol declared martial law in an unannounced televised broadcast. Lasting only six hours, the declaration came with decisive drawbacks. Yet, the reasons prompting it and the aftermath have seemingly exposed a deeper problem within the Republic of Korea (ROK). With 2024 coming to an end, it seems that rather than cooling down, the situation in the young Republic of Korea is anything but calm. Along with a Jeju Air plane crash on December 29, 2024, both the President and Prime Minister were impeached by the Korean Parliament, making the Minister of the Economy and Finance acting as president. The end of 2024 seems to be the beginning of many woes for the young Asian democracy.
Three main factors prompted President Yoon’s declaration of martial law: North Korean threats, President Yoon’s personal reasons, and the legislative gridlock that exists in the ROK Parliament.
President Yoon declared martial law to protect against North Korean subterfuge, using the conviction of four South Korean labor union officials as further justification. The four South Korean officials were allegedly ordered to gain control of the labor union under instruction from North Korea. While much is left to speculate as to what espionage President Yoon was referring to specifically, the ROK constitution explicitly mentions that the entirety of the Korean Peninsula belongs to the ROK. The ROK continues to view North Korea as a threat. Despite the attempts to maintain some form of detente with North Korea, these attempts have borne very little fruit. North Korea has threatened peace and stability in the ROK in various ways including border skirmishes, island bombardments, infiltration attempts, and assassinations. Even in terms of domestic terrorism, the North Korean state has planned and commenced operations that killed and abducted citizens of the ROK directly such as the infamous Korean Air Flight 858 bombing, the Gimpo Airport bombing, and the Korean Air YS-11 hijacking.
Since taking office on May 10, 2022, President Yoon has been largely frustrated in his efforts to bring about his political agenda in the ROK, largely due to the 2020 and 2024 parliamentary elections swinging in favor of the Democratic Party of Korea (DPK). More specifically, the DPK denied President Yoon’s budget proposals, making him a lame duck with little political power. Additionally, President Yoon’s wife, Kim Keon-hee, was accused by the DPK of breaching anti-corruption law in the ROK when she accepted a $2,200 USD Dior handbag as a gift and manipulated the stock price of an auto dealership. With these accusations, the DPK has attempted to prosecute Ms. Kim who is also the CEO and president of the art exhibition company Covana Contents. With the DPK seeking to shoot down any budget proposals as well as attempting to prosecute his wife, President Yoon became frustrated and felt personally threatened, which likely influenced his choice to declare martial law.
While President Yoon may be blameworthy to some extent, the DPK’s actions should be examined before and after the martial law declaration. Since President Yoon has taken office, the DPK has issued twenty-nine impeachment motions, with thirteen motions passing. These motions were based on very little evidence or proof, with many mistakes made in terms of dates and names, and attempted to impeach officials like the Korea Communications Commission Chairman Lee Jin-sook. The DPK has even threatened to impeach the current President Choi Sang-mok if he did not appoint a Constitutional Court judge. Regardless, it is safe to say that President Yoon is not the only figure at fault for this current situation of political strife.
According to Article 77 of the ROK Constitution, the President has the power to declare martial law during a national emergency. There are two types of Korean martial law: those being extraordinary and precautionary. In this case, President Yoon declared extraordinary martial law. As a result, freedom of press and freedom of assembly were restricted. The President must also immediately inform Parliament of the martial law order after it is declared. If Parliament votes to lift the martial law order, the President must comply. Here, President Yoon did comply with Parliament’s vote to lift the martial law order. However, one can interpret Article 77 Section 1 of the Korean constitution to give President Yoon authority to decide what is defined as a national emergency for the purpose of declaring martial law.
As the Korean Constitutional Court now grapples with the impeachment hearing for President Yoon, there are consequences from this martial law declaration. For example, the Korean stock market suffered over a 100 trillion won (roughly $6.8 million) loss, and the exchange rate between the Korean won and U.S. dollar increased substantially. With much uncertainty in the days to follow, Korea is suffering from President Yoon’s martial law declaration and is now seen as politically chaotic at the international scope. Be that as it may, it can also be said that Korea has grown greatly from the days of authoritarianism as the Korean public successfully opposed the martial law declaration—a welcomed change for the young republic.
While it remains to be seen how President Yoon will justify his actions on that cold December night in his impeachment trial, this rationale at least grants us a glance into his reasoning behind this declaration. Although North Korea is a common justification used by prior dictators in the ROK for martial law or coups, it is not entirely without merit. North Korea has been and shall remain the enemy of the ROK for as long as its hostile missile launches and incursions into the territory of the ROK continues. From the Korean War to the active frontline known as the DMZ, there should be no question as to the adversarial nature of North Korea and the dangers which it poses to the Korean people. One may see that this situation is not merely President Yoon’s blunder but is a sign of Korea’s legislative deadlock and inability to negotiate, a hallmark of all democracies around the world.
It is clear that President Yoon’s impeachment is not completely supported by the general populace in Korea or even abroad. However, the DPK has its political agenda to push this impeachment of President Yoon to force an early presidential election to ensure that the DPK leader, Lee Jae-Myung, is not convicted by the constitutional courts. Pressure is also mounting both at home and abroad to halt the impeachment, figures such as Korean celebrity singer, JK Kim Dongwook, and United States House Representative, Young Kim, have publicly expressed their support for President Yoon. Neither the DPK or President Yoon is without fault in this fiasco, but there is hope that the ROK may emerge as a stronger democracy with proper guards against both legislative and executive authoritarianism.
*The views expressed in this article do not represent the views of Santa Clara University.
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