Yoon must demonstrate flexibility and balance

Flexibility is a virtue of a great leader who can change the path in history.

Lee Ha-kyungThe author is a senior columnist of the JoongAng Ilbo. The Korean president is welcomed everywhere across the world these days, largely thanks to the strong economy. President Yoon Suk Yeol owes it to “competitive Korean companies.” Former President Park Chung Hee had been the driver of Korea’s dramatic growth in the 1960s and ‘70s based on the engine — the five-year economic development plan.

The state-led development was initiated under the government of founding president Syngman Rhee. In 1957, Song In-sang, the minister in charge of industrial development, proposed a state-led economic development plan to rescue the economy from the war rubble. The president first opposed the idea, as it was basically a communist model.

President Yoon Suk Yeol, center, holds a scarf reading “Fair Korea, With Women” with other attendees at a women’s promotion event hosted by the Korean National Council of Women at Coex in Gangnam District, southern Seoul, on Nov. 1. [KIM HYUN-DONG]

But Song didn’t step back. He brought home from his trip to the United States a 1954 book by Arthur Lewis, a pioneering scholar on postwar economic development. Lewis, born in the Caribbean island nation of Saint Lucia, was the first black economist to teach at the London School of Economics and the first black full-time professor at Princeton University. His theory on developmental economics brought him the Nobel Prize in economic sciences in 1979. After reading the book, President Rhee gave the minister the full authority to do what he wanted.

Since the president thought a five-year span was too extensive, the minister drew up a three-year plan for cabinet approval. The United States advised Korea to concentrate on farming like its other Asian peers liberated from colonization. The Rhee administration rejected the idea and set industrialization as the growth model. The president was convinced that the country lacking natural resources must earn through exports. The foundation for the state-guided development model under the Park Chung Hee regime was laid under the far-sighted founding president.

The three-year plan was extended to five years under the parliamentary government which was launched after the April 19, 1960, revolution ending Rhee’s rule. President Park, who took power in 1961 through a military coup, succeeded the planned growth model. Despite the changes in the ruling power, economic policy stayed consistent. If the policies of the past government had been entirely scrapped just like these days, Korea could not have achieved the Miracle on the Han River.

President Yoon Suk Yeol’s governing style has changed decisively. The domineering and aggressive tone has turned more modest and engaging. He stopped criticizing the former government during his National Assembly address to ask for the opposition’s support for the government’s budget proposal for 2024. He repeatedly asked for cooperation, extended his hand for a handshake with majority Democratic Party (DP) leader Lee Jae-myung, and sat through critical speeches by opposition lawmakers. Such an engaging approach is necessary for a leader to fight both economic and security challenges.

But President Yoon must change the philosophy of his governance now. He must first depart with his adherence to an ideological battle. His overemphasis on ideology has already fatigued a number of centrists valuing practicality, as well as many reasonable conservatives. During his Liberation Day speech, the president lambasted the “communist totalitarian forces who orchestrate the dirty propaganda campaign as if there were fighters for democracy and human rights.” During a conference with members of his People Power Party (PPP), the president encouraged them to fight against those who claim “1 plus 1 is 100.”

The bombast against ambiguous hostile forces is like tilting at windmills. The outbursts may please die-hard rightists, but they push the community deeper into a divide. Democracy works in a healthy manner only when the freedom of thoughts and expression is appreciated.

The worst outcome from the ideological battle was the demeaning of the legendary independence fighter Hong Beom-do as a communist. Hong was awarded with the postmortem Order of Merit for National Foundation by the anti-communist regime under Park Chung Hee. A warship was even devoted to his name under former conservative president Park Geun-hye. The people struggling under economic hardship could not understand why the government was wasting national resources over the past conducts of a revered independence fighter. The public sentiment always should be upheld.

Rhee, the founding president, abhorred communism and socialism. He even argued for a forceful unification of the divided land despite strong U.S. opposition. But the seasoned statesman compromised his hard-line conviction for national interest. He endorsed the state-led economic development model reflecting socialism. He accommodated an approach by the enemy in order to address real challenges. Flexibility is a virtue of a great leader who can change the path in history. Sadly, the president of today lacks such virtue.

We welcome Yoon’s turn to innovation and cooperation. The move gives the PPP the edge over the DP, still intoxicated by a minor by-election victory. But if the president does not follow up with flexibility and balance, the change in gestures can invite more disappointments.