South Koreans Just Showed Resistance Can Work

It's risky. It's costly. And it can succeed

By now, you’re aware—I hope!—of the attempted autogolpe (yes, that’s Spanish for “self-coup”) carried out by the president of South Korea. As of this writing, it appears that the sudden declaration of martial law by the president has been overturned by the country’s legislature. It seems likely from this perspective that impeachment (and likely conviction) may come to pass, and also that the situation will not stop there. (For one thing, once you’ve called out the military against the legislature, you may not be in the mood to meekly obey people you’ve called traitors; for another thing, if the military’s shown themselves willing to—at a minimum—follow those orders, you have another constitutional crisis a-brewing.)

For now, let’s recap some key points.

1. “It” can happen anywhere. My text threads were blowing up this afternoon and I was not alone in viewing the Korean crisis as shocking—in some ways, more shocking than January 6. I’m not a Korea expert, or even a Korea “fan”, but I had not heard of any rumors that things were more than usually tense in a country with famously combative politics. This seemed to come out of nowhere in one of the world’s richest countries where democracy is young but, it seemed, vibrant. This sort of “bolt from the blue” should probably be priced in a little more.

2. Global democracy is under greater strains than I thought. Just last week, Brazilian authorities released a report showing that then-President Jair Bolsonaro was very close to carrying out a coup against incoming President Lula to stay in power. If you’ve paid attention to Mexico, you’ll know that the quality of democracy there is under some strain (ironically, because of moving to elect more judges). France is facing problems; Germany as well. A pillar of democracy here, a pillar of democracy there, pretty soon you’re talking a structural problem. South Korea’s sudden crisis makes me more pessimistic about all of this, even though …

3. You can fight back. The people and politicians of South Korea were heroic overnight, moving to preempt the (clumsy and belated) attempt of the president to cut off the organs of Korean democracy. We’ll undoubtedly learn more about this attempt but for now it matters that legislators could get to the National Assembly building and carry out their duties. He who hesitates is lost; the political system that hesitates cannot save themselves.

4. You can’t let something become a fait accompli. The first rule of political analysis is that it’s rarely Tom Clancy; it’s often Veep. Imagine Selina Meyer plotting a coup. You can thwart her with, as they say in baseball, “ordinary effort”. But if you surrender, you can’t.

5. You won’t always win. Israeli demonstrations against the Netanyahu administration didn’t prevent major changes to the country’s judiciary. That was different: it was, after all, legal and proper, at least in form, unlike a bizarro late-night declaration of martial law. But the protests certainly made the process harder.

6. In some ways, the easiest battles to win are the pitched skirmishes, not the wars of attrition. Showing up to one, or two, or three nights of protests is easier than showing up for a decade of elections. And yet…