The conservatives’ sin of failing to give

Home > Opinion > Columns

The conservatives’ sin of failing to give

Published: 26 Jan. 2026, 00:01

Audio report: written by reporters, read by AI

Choi Hoon

The author is a senior columnist at the JoongAng Ilbo.

The prosecution’s demand for the death penalty for former president Yoon Suk Yeol and the 23-year prison sentence handed to former prime minister Han Duck-soo amount to a call for a sweeping overhaul of conservative politics in Korea. Yet the level of reflection shown by the leader of the People Power Party (PPP), who has said only that “the declaration of martial law was an inappropriate measure for the situation,” falls far short of what would be needed to revive a political tradition that has effectively been pronounced dead. It is a grim spectacle. There is little sign of searing repentance or firm resolve.

People Power Party leader Jang Dong-hyeok is seen during a hunger strike at the National Assembly's main rotunda in Yeouido, western Seoul on Jan. 15. [LIM HYUN-DONG]

The most incisive critique of conservative politics has instead come from within conservative thought itself, notably from former professor Park Hyo-jong. He once identified five cardinal sins of conservatism: the sin of failing to foresee the future, the sin of merely preserving without cultivating, the sin of indulging in self-fulfillment without achieving self-transcendence, the sin of failing to give and the sin of abusing privilege. The culmination of all these failings was the collapse of generational renewal.

Former President Yoon Suk Yeol speaks during his trial on insurrection charges at the Seoul Central District Court in Seocho District, southern Seoul, on Dec. 29, 2025. [SEOUL CENTRAL DISTRICT COURT]

Reduced to a party without even a credible presidential candidate of its own, conservatives installed the largely unfamiliar mercenary Yoon Suk Yeol and have paid a heavy price. Their frantic maneuvers, flirting with figures such as Kim Moon-soo outside the party and even attempting to draft Han Duck-soo in a mirage of regaining power, ended in abject failure. It was retribution. Without people, how can any ideology or party hope to survive?

Ironically, the period of most vigorous generational turnover came a generation earlier, during the era of the so-called three Kims. President Kim Young-sam, in his sixties, recruited reform-minded figures in their thirties and forties such as Lee In-je, Kim Moon-soo, Sohn Hak-kyu, Hong Joon-pyo and Oh Se-hoon, sustaining the conservative lineage to this day. President Kim Dae-Jung likewise began, while still in opposition, to cultivate younger politicians in their twenties and thirties, including Kim Min-seok, Lee In-young, Woo Sang-ho and Im Jong-seok, who later became central figures of progressive politics, with Kim Min-seok serving as prime minister and Woo as senior secretary for political affairs.

The famous call for leadership in one’s forties was rooted in the lived insight of these two Kims. When Kim Young-sam and Kim Dae-Jung declared their presidential bids in 1969 at ages 41 and 45, they argued that power transfer had failed because aging opposition leaders could not match a youthful military regime, urging a dynamic younger generation to step forward. Though party leader Yu Jin-san dismissed them as political minors, they drew explosive support from a public frustrated by constitutional manipulation. At the time, only 22.62 percent of Koreans were over 50, compared to 45.67 percent today. Targeting even President Park Chung Hee, then 54, their wager was generational change.

Since then, generational renewal has consistently separated success from failure in Korean politics. Progressives succeeded by continuously nurturing younger cohorts through the Roh Moo-hyun and Moon Jae-in administrations, guiding them from aideships and local councils to provincial posts and the National Assembly. It was European-style politics rooted in the field. Even after setbacks, politicians remained engaged, accumulating experience. President Lee Jae Myung is a prime example. Conservatives, by contrast, relied on top-down selection of older elites from the legal profession and bureaucracy, protecting vested interests and creating a generational chasm.

The result is stark. In the Democratic Party, there are 81 lawmakers born in the 1970s, 23 from the 1980s and even two from the 1990s, a sweeping generational turnover accounting for 64 percent of party seats. In the People Power Party, however, only 38 lawmakers total, or 35 percent, are from the 1970s or later. The arrival of a 39-year-old like Kim Jae-sub still makes headlines.

Policy agendas show a similar disconnect. Recent research finds that hard-line traditional conservatives make up just 17 percent of the electorate, while a moderate conservative bloc, centrist on economic and social issues, conservative on the alliance with the United States and relatively pragmatic on North Korea and cooperation with China, has surged to 51 percent. Yet the PPP remains trapped catering to the older 17 percent and shackled to Yoon Suk Yeol. Defeat is inevitable.

Han Dong-hoon, former leader of the People Power Party, leaves a press conference at the National Assembly’s Communication Center in Yeouido, Seoul, on Jan. 14, after stating his position on the party ethics committee’s decision to expel him. [NEWS1]

There once was a chance. In 2021, a 36-year-old party leader emerged, the first instance of a young politician rising to power on his own. But President Yoon and senior party figures could not embrace Lee Jun-seok’s blunt criticism. They expelled generational and agenda renewal and reverted to a structure dominated by prosecutors, bureaucrats and hard-core loyalists. The controversy over Han Dong-hoon’s party bulletin board was ill judged, but was expelling him from conservatism truly justified? Is this not merely Lee Jun-seok season two, purging every next generation that threatens vested interests? Those who indulged in self-fulfillment without a word of dissent throughout the Yoon administration should first atone.

Conservatism means embracing and giving. It is the weapon with which to defeat progressivism. Politics is a marathon. Without nurturing future runners to cross the finish line, a conservatism that cannot give has no future.

This article was originally written in Korean and translated by a bilingual reporter with the help of generative AI tools. It was then edited by a native English-speaking editor. All AI-assisted translations are reviewed and refined by our newsroom.