[Asia Democracy Issue Briefing] The Role of Korea’s Election Commission and the Quality of Elections

According to the Varieties of Democracy Institute, the freedom and fairness of South Korea’s elections have improved dramatically since the country first democratized. Figure 1 below shows how the quality of South Korea’s elections has changed between 1948 and 2020 (“election was free and fair” is indicated in blue) and the country’s rating on the Electoral Democracy Index (indicated in red). There was little change in election quality and the democracy index in the 40 years that followed the constitutional election of 1948. With the change to a direct election system implemented in 1987, the freedom and fairness of South Korea’s elections shot up, and the country’s rating on the democracy index increased greatly as well.