Reforming the National Assembly Election System: Transitioning to Ranked-Choice Voting
Institute for Future Strategy Issue Brief, Vol. 62
“Reforming the National Assembly Election System: Transitioning to Ranked-Choice Voting”
This issue brief proposes directions for reforming South Korea’s National Assembly electoral system to alleviate the winner-take-all structure and adversarial polarization of Korean politics. It emphasizes the need for institutional incentives that encourage a transition to a multiparty system and greater diversity within political parties, so that the preferences of moderate voters can be more properly represented.
The current National Assembly electoral system combines single-member districts and first-past-the-post voting with a nationwide semi-compensatory proportional representation system. However, because there are relatively few proportional-representation seats, the system has struggled to sufficiently reduce distortions of voter preferences and wasted votes. It has also produced problems such as the emergence of satellite parties and opaque selection processes for proportional-representation candidates.
Rather than fully expanding a German-style mixed-member proportional representation system, this issue brief proposes the “Irish-style Ranked-Choice Voting (RCV)” system, implemented in multi-member districts electing three to five representatives, as an alternative. Under this system, voters rank candidates in order of preference. The brief explains that it can better balance multiple values—including proportionality, responsiveness to local constituents, prevention of wasted votes, and voters’ freedom of choice—thereby enhancing voters’ sense of political efficacy.
In particular, because candidates must seek not only first-preference votes but also second- and third-preference support, the system may increase the likelihood that moderate candidates are elected over highly antagonistic ones. It may also promote diversity and competition within parties, helping to ease adversarial polarization driven by hard-line party members and political fandoms.
The brief further recommends that the introduction of ranked-choice voting be accompanied by reforms to party nomination processes and revisions to current laws that perpetuate the vested interests of the two major parties. It also calls for adequate public education on the new electoral system and sustained civic-society deliberation to press political leaders for institutional reform.
