정책정당의 부침과 한국 민주주의 30년: 정책정당발전의 역사적, 이론적 제약과 한국정당의 변동

초록

Party theorists have shared a normative attitude toward the notion of policy-based parties(pbp) for the last 30 years of Korean democracy. Yet such a normative view has not attained a substantive progress toward a policy-base parties due to two main reasons, historical legacy and problems of theoretical perspectives. This article focuses on, first, the historical legacies since the authoritarian era on the underdevelopment of pbp, in particular, the lasting impact of strong state-weak parties tradition in Korea. Specifically, Korean parties have had characteristics of personal leadership over party organization, fragile linkage to civil society, and inferior status against the omnipotent state since the authoritarian era. Second, theoretical efforts have not provided substantial ground for the development of pbp. The so-called ‘strong-party perspective’ borrowed the historical experiences of Western European parties which represented solid linkage between civil society and government focusing on class conflict structure. Such notion has turned out to be quite irrelevant in Korean realities of weak parties tradition. The concept of “intra-parliament parties” tries to overcome the shortcomings of “strong-party perspective” while taking into account the strengths and weakness of Korean parties after democratization. Yet even with enhanced relevance to Korean realities, “intra-parliament parties” has not been successful in producing meaningful research agenda. Recently, researches have flourished focusing on policy based voting behavior among the electorate. It means that political parties is strengthening its role of policy based electoral mobilization, only in very moderate and volatile senses. All this is calling for our efforts to revisit the notion of pbp, in the context of shrinking role of parties for democratic representation and legitimation.

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