[Public Opinion Briefing 71-1] Characteristics of the Sejong City Issue / Mismatch Between Values and Preferences Regarding Sejong City

[Public Opinion Briefing 71] Special Feature on Sejong City Public Opinion Survey by EAI and Korea Research

1. Characteristics of the Sejong City Issue / Mismatch Between Values and Preferences Regarding Sejong City

2. Public Perception of the Three Major Sejong City Issues / Sejong City Solutions and Political Impact

Characteristics of the Sejong City Issue: The Duality and Fluidity of Public Opinion on Sejong City

Characteristics of the Sejong City Issue: Urgent Need for Public Opinion Analysis Considering the Issue's Characteristics and Duality

The Sejong City issue is one where conflicting values, making a choice between two options difficult, clash. The values of "balanced regional development" and "political trust" advocated by the original plan, and the values of "administrative efficiency and national competitiveness" advocated by the revised plan, are all considered important in Korean society. In such cases, individuals who do not have strong partisan leanings toward a particular party or clear ideological preferences, nor economic interests in the issue, tend to find themselves in conflict between these clashing values. It is now widely accepted that individuals with such conflicting stances may provide inconsistent responses depending on subtle variations in the timing of the survey or the context highlighted within the survey (Alvarez and Brehm 2002; Zaller 1992).

Furthermore, due to its nature, the Sejong City issue is classified not as an "easy issue" for voters to decide their policy preferences, but as a "hard issue" that is difficult for the general public to take a stance on. Generally, issues related to symbolic goals or policy directions are considered easy issues, whereas issues concerning the means and methods to achieve such goals are classified as difficult issues for the general public. Sejong City clearly falls into the category of a difficult issue as it involves the methodological question of how to achieve important values and goals such as balanced regional development and strengthening national competitiveness, and requires its own calculation of costs and benefits for both the revised and original plans. This is a challenging issue even for experts.

In such situations, the majority of the general public tends to make their policy choices not based on an evaluation of the policy itself, but on factors such as their favorability towards the party or leader championing the issue and policy, their region of origin, or sometimes non-policy factors like the method of policy implementation rather than the policy itself. Therefore, responses to questions about policy preferences may, in fact, reflect the public's perception of non-policy factors utilized for policy selection, rather than their perception of the policy itself.

As the prospects for a political resolution to the Sejong City issue become uncertain, proposals are being made to resolve it through public opinion polls or referendums. While it is a time when exploring alternatives with all possibilities open is necessary, more careful and thorough consideration is needed regarding whether the Sejong City issue is a matter to be resolved by consulting the public's will. This is because, in the case of the Sejong City issue, where preference determination is difficult and dual values conflict, a referendum could easily devolve into a political issue, such as a political reconfirmation of the president, rather than a rational evaluation of the policy itself.

Discrepancy Between Policy Values and Policy Preferences

Policy Value: The original plan's emphasis on trust garners more empathy than the revised plan's emphasis on competitiveness.

"Prioritizing Promises/Trust with the Public" - Original Plan: 56.4% empathy; "Prioritizing Administrative Efficiency, National Competitiveness" - 48.9%

Policy Preference: The revised plan is favored in terms of Sejong City development policy.

Support for revised plan: 47.6%; Support for original plan: 32.4%; Don't know: 20.0%

Policy values favor the original plan, while policy preferences lean towards the revised plan.

Although public support for the revised plan outnumbered that for the original plan, the original plan garnered greater empathy in terms of the legitimacy and values it pursued. Regarding the revised plan's argument that "the original plan weakens national competitiveness by dispersing administrative agencies," 48.9% agreed, while 46.7% disagreed, showing a close split. Conversely, regarding the original plan's justification that "the government's revised plan betrays promises and trust with the public," 56.4% agreed, exceeding the 40.1% who disagreed.

[Figure 1] Sejong City Policy Values: Empathy Rate (%)

On the other hand, when asked about policy preferences for Sejong City, 47.6% supported the revised plan, 32.4% supported the original plan, and 20.0% were undecided. In a regular survey conducted on November 27th of the previous year, immediately after President Lee Myung-bak announced his position on revising Sejong City and officially apologized through a dialogue with the public, support for the revised plan was 50.4%, support for maintaining the original plan was 31.4%, and undecided was 18.2%. While not statistically significant changes, the revised plan saw a 2.8% decrease, while support for the original plan and undecided responses slightly increased (by 1.0% and 1.8% respectively). Despite the government and ruling party's expectations of increased support for the revised plan after the Lunar New Year holiday, and contrary to their hopes, support has faltered, yet preference for the revised plan still outweighs that for the original plan.

[Figure 2] Sejong City Policy Preference: Comparison of November 2009 and February 2010 (%)

Why the Divergent Evaluations?

From the perspective of policy values, the normative value of "political trust," which emphasizes keeping promises and trust with the public, resonates more strongly with the public than the values of administrative efficiency and national competitiveness advocated by the revised plan. Conversely, the core policy value of national competitiveness, highlighted by the revised plan by pointing out the administrative inefficiency issues inherent in the original plan, garnered relatively less empathy. The public's distrust in the government and politicians is easily felt, but empathy for administrative inefficiency and the value of national competitiveness, which are difficult to assess tangibly in the short term, seems less forthcoming.

Furthermore, regardless of the reasons, it is difficult to find a counterargument to the criticism that overturning the promises made to the public, based on political agreements between parties and the current president's campaign pledges, will undermine trust. This appears to be why doubts about sincerity persist. Additionally, the perceived lack of sufficient efforts by the government and proponents of the revised plan to restore trust, beyond the president's public apology, can be seen as one of the reasons for lagging behind in the competition of values.

However, in terms of actual policy preferences, support for the revised plan is dominant. For the revised plan, it appears that the public had more consistent opportunities to be exposed to information about the content and policy effects of the revised plan following the President's apology regarding Sejong City, the announcement of the government's plan, and the full-scale promotion of the government's plan around the Lunar New Year. Despite the controversy, this appears to be the result of the Sejong City development direction and plans being effectively disseminated through the process of concentrating various policy measures for Sejong City development on the revised plan, to the extent that concerns about reverse discrimination in other regions have grown. In particular, support for the revised plan is maintained against the backdrop of concerns that the relocation of administrative agencies would effectively lead to a division of the capital.

In contrast, for the original plan, the arguments for and against the revised plan were primarily focused on the normative issue of political trust, leaving little opportunity for the public to widely learn about the main content or implementation plans of the original plan. Instead of a strategy of persuading by comparing the pros and cons of the original and revised plans during the announcement and discussion of the revised plan's specific policy plans, the response was a principled opposition stating that the revised plan was not worth considering. This effectively blocked opportunities to disseminate information about the original plan. The fact that the public's favorable response to the revised plan is faltering does not directly translate into increased support for the original plan, which can be attributed to the relative lack of updated information about the original plan's content.

Sejong City Value Conflict:

Prioritizing Trust: 36.0% vs. Prioritizing Competitiveness: 28.8% vs. Both Sides: 22.4% vs. Neither Side: 12.8%

[Figure 3] Types of Sejong City Development Values (%)

Classifying public perception of the Sejong City issue based on empathy for the policy values advocated by the revised and original plans reveals four types of respondents: "Prioritizing Trust," who empathize with the original plan's logic of prioritizing trust with the public and are opposed to the revised plan's logic of preventing administrative inefficiency and weakening national competitiveness; "Prioritizing Competitiveness," who are opposed to the original plan and empathize with the revised plan's logic; "Both Sides," who accept the logic of both positions; and "Neither Side," who are cynical towards both positions. According to the survey results, "Prioritizing Trust" was the largest group at 36.0%, followed by "Prioritizing Competitiveness" at 28.8%, "Both Sides" at 22.4%, and "Neither Side" at 12.8%. If we consider "Both Sides" and "Neither Side" as conflicting perception types where dual values coexist, then three out of ten people hold conflicting stances that are neither a choice between the revised and original plans nor a simple integration or rejection of both.

* Excluding don't know/no response

Seoul and the Chungcheong region, with vested interests in Sejong City, prioritize specific values.

Other regions show a high proportion of 'both sides' or 'neither side' opinions, indicating potential fluidity in policy support.

When examining the perception types surrounding the Sejong City controversy by region, voters in the Chungcheong region and Seoul, who have direct vested interests in the current Sejong City issue, showed a higher proportion of preference for specific values, while contradictory perception types were relatively fewer. In Seoul, the 'prioritizing national competitiveness' argument, advocated by the revised plan, constituted the majority at 44.0%, while the 'prioritizing political trust' argument, put forth by the original plan, was only 27.0%. Respondents who accepted both values (19.5%) or rejected both values (9.4%), exhibiting a contradictory attitude, were the lowest at 28.9%.

Conversely, in the Chungcheong region, the 'prioritizing political trust' argument exceeded half, reaching 53.8%, while the 'prioritizing competitiveness' argument was only 15.4%. Contradictory perceptions were the second lowest at 30.6%, following Seoul. However, among these, the proportion of those who agreed with both positions was 28.2%, the highest nationwide. This means that in the Chungcheong region, three out of ten individuals are conflicted between the two positions.

In the Daegu/Gyeongsangbuk-do region, where public opinion favors the revised plan, the argument prioritizing national competitiveness was 38.2%, while prioritizing trust was 25.0%. In contrast, contradictory opinions accounted for 36.8%, slightly exceeding the average. Within contradictory opinions, the 'accepting both sides' attitude, showing agreement with both values, was 22.5%, and the 'rejecting both sides' attitude was 14.5%.

In the Honam and PK regions, the perception prioritizing the original plan's political trust was 41.9% and 40.2%, respectively, while those prioritizing only the revised plan's policy value were as low as 21.3% and 17.6%. These regions, along with Chungcheong, emerged as areas where the original plan's policy value held sway. Notably, in these regions, the proportion of individuals with contradictory perceptions, who highly value both political trust and national competitiveness, or reject both, were 40.5% (accepting both: 27.0%, rejecting both: 13.5%) and 38.5% (accepting both: 27.0%, rejecting both: 11.5%), respectively. The 'accepting both sides' attitude, showing agreement with both positions, was 27.0% in these regions, the second highest after Chungcheong. Although the political trust argument is dominant, the significant number of people who also highly value national competitiveness suggests the reason for strong support for the revised plan's implementation despite the original plan's policy value being more prevalent at the value level.

Unlike Seoul voters, the Gyeonggi/Incheon region showed the lowest proportion of agreement with the revised plan's policy value at 26.2%, and a higher proportion agreeing with the original plan's policy value of prioritizing trust at 36.4%. Among residents of the Gyeonggi/Incheon region, 37.3% held contradictory opinions, the highest proportion. Among these, the 'rejecting both sides' proportion was 18.4%, similar to the 'accepting both sides' proportion of 18.9%. Unlike Seoul or the Chungcheong region, they are not direct stakeholders, nor do they possess the strong anti-MB sentiment seen in Honam, suggesting a high degree of cynical attitude towards the Sejong City controversy.

In conclusion, even in Seoul and Chungcheong, which are leaning towards the specific values advocated by the original and revised proposals, there are considerable segments of respondents who hold ambivalent values. Therefore, public opinion regarding Sejong City remains open to significant shifts depending on their inclinations. It is expected that voters with a bi-partisan stance, experiencing value conflicts within a framework of empathy for both positions rather than a cynical rejection of both, will show a greater potential for attitude change. This suggests that considerable room for shifts in public opinion remains at the values level.

[Figure 4] Comparison of Sejong City Policy Value Type Distribution by Region

* Excludes 'Don't know/No answer'