Since its founding in 1947, the Republic of Korea has had 10 presidents. Some of them were good and some of them were not. Unfortunately, however, nearly all of them seemed to suffer certain psychological problems, which inadvertently affected their policies and ruling styles. Of course, it was the people of Korea who had to endure their “not quite normal” mentality and behavior. 

When President Syngman Rhee returned from the United States and was inaugurated as the first president of South Korea, he had already turned 73. As an old man with a Ph.D. from Princeton and who was fluent in English, Rhee must have firmly believed that he was the only man who could lead the nation in the right direction. It is true that Rhee successfully built the foundations of the fledgling nation caught between China, Japan, the Soviet Union and the United States. Nevertheless, his sense of superiority eventually turned him into a dictator who wanted to remain president for the rest of his life. The result was the 4/19 student revolution, which caused the bloodshed of so many young people.

The next president was Yoon Bo-sun, a gentle, aristocratic man with a moderate personality. But his well-known rivalry with Prime Minister Chang Myon crippled his administration. Yoon’s tenure was brief, for he was forced to step down following the 5/16 military coup led by Gen. Park Chung-hee.

President Park Chung-hee was a strong man who ruled the country for 18 years with an iron fist. However, Park successfully turned South Korea into a highly industrialized country, bringing about its remarkable economic development.

Park was stern and tough, but had psychological trauma nonetheless. When he was a junior officer in the ROK Army in 1948, Park was arrested and sentenced to death, accused of being a Communist collaborator. Thanks to a sympathetic army general, Park narrowly escaped death and was later acquitted. In order to overcome his “red complex,” Park became a vehement anti-Communist and mercilessly persecuted communist collaborators and sympathizers in South Korea during his tenure.

After the assassination of Park in 1979, Choi Kyu-ha briefly sat as president, but was quickly turned out when Gen. Chun Doo-hwan seized power through another coup. Despite the fact that Chun had been a simple, optimistic man, he must have been haunted by the illegitimacy of his administration. Thus, he became another dictator, crushing his political dissidents who constantly asserted his illegitimacy.

Perhaps Chun’s successor, Roh Tae-woo, and Roh’s successor, Kim Young-sam, did not seem to have many psychological issues, for they were not complex men in nature.

Surely, however, Kim Dae-jung did. Kim was a man who had survived political turmoil against all odds. He barely escaped death at least twice, and was involuntarily exiled to the United States. When he won the presidential election in 1998, therefore, it must have been not only the fulfillment of a lifelong wish, but also an opportunity for him to vent his years of spite and satisfy his resentment against his political opponents. Of course, Kim was a dexterous politician and thus seldom expressed such feelings openly. But his aides and followers were less cautious and more outspoken than Kim in paying off old scores.

President Roh Moo-hyun was a good example of such a case stated above. Since he was a man who was born into a lower class family and thus unable to receive a college education, Roh publicly expressed his resentment of the rich, the elite and prime universities. Consequently, his policy focused on redistributing wealth instead of stimulating the economy, and revolved around depriving elite universities of privileges rather than supporting and developing them to compete with other world class universities. The results were disastrous. South Korea remained nationalistic at a time when the world was rapidly and radically globalizing.

As for President Lee Myung-bak, he is not so much a man of grudges or resentment as a man of ambition. He often recollects that when he was a child, his family was so poor that he had to peddle things on the street. He tried so hard to improve his life that he was able to become president of Hyundai Engineering and Construction Co., mayor of Seoul, and finally president of South Korea. Obviously, Lee is a highly self-reliant man who made his own fortune. Probably for that reason, however, he has a reputation for not listening to others or consulting with others, because he thinks he can do everything by himself.

Now we need a president who is more of an “average” man, someone who was raised in a middle class family, received a good education, and thus has no distorted grudges or hostility against our society. We no longer need a president who is full of bitterness, resentment or complexes. We need a president who is sound in mentality, someone who has common sense, and who is ready to listen to others. Then, our country will be on the right track, healthy and sound at last.

By Kim Seong-kon

Kim Seong-kon, a professor of English at Seoul National University, is editor of the literary quarterly “21st Century Literature.” ― Ed.