Presidential personnel innovation for Presidential appointees in Korea: toward an institutional Presidency

Most presidents may come to realise that a successful individual, gifted though he may be, cannot do everything himself. The president must be assisted by a capable staff and trusted advisors. They are key to policy effectiveness. Surprisingly, in Korea, the past record of presidential performances in these respects has been less than exemplary. Under the current incumbency President Roh (2003–2008), there is accordingly growing public expectation that improvements might take place in his nascent administration. Accordingly, this article assesses the personnel problems of Presidential appointees in the previous as well as the current administration. After a brief but critical examination of the personnel selection system, it considers the ongoing efforts to undertake reform and its innovative direction. In conclusion, it observes that whilst the personnel system for merit‐based civil servants is reasonably well established in the Korean government, the presidential personnel system for political appointments is seriously underdeveloped. The author accordingly suggests some improvements of the system for ‘spoils‐based’ appointees. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

How a Presidential Primary Debate Changed Attitudes of Audience Members

This article examines the effect of primary season presidential debates on voters' attitudes toward presidential candidates. Employing a pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design, we examine the 1996 Arizona Republican primary debate. We find that the debate led respondents to change their viability and electability assessments of the candidates and produced significant changes in respondents' vote preferences. In addition, we demonstrate that changes in viability, changes in electability, as well as differences between expected and actual debate performance influenced the vote preferences of audience members. We conclude by speculating about the debate's effect on the Arizona Republican primary, and by noting the potentially important differences between the impact of general election and primary debates.     

新时期变革中的韩国高级文官制度

本文探讨的是韩国政府公共服务改革的热门话题之一:高级文官制度改革。这项新制度的实施将对政府官员的选任与委派、绩效管理、工资制度、培训方式等带来变化。     

Appeal rate and caseload: evidence from civil litigation in Korea

Courts of modern democratic societies have generally implemented appeal procedures to correct potential errors in ruling. However, considering the time and effort that both litigants spend, availability of an appeal cannot be better than reaching the correct judgment in the original case. This difficulty raises the policy issue of how to reduce the rate of appeals and improve welfare of litigants. In this paper, we assert that lower caseloads allow judges to expend more time and effort on each case, contributing to lower appeal rates. Analysis of court-level data from Korea corroborates our inference.     

Understanding Modi and minorities: The BJP-led NDA government in India and religious minorities

In the May 2014 general elections in India, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) emerged as the majority party. The BJP has formed a coalition with regional parties (the National Democratic Alliance), but many view the event as a “critical election,” presaging the realignment of Indian politics along Hindu nationalist values. This article reviews the approaches used to understand the BJP-led NDA government’s policies toward religious minorities and argues that far from marking a radical departure, there are more continuities than discontinuities in these policies with previous administrations.     

Public and elite opinion on international human rights law: Completing the causal chain of the domestic compliance mechanism

Why do states comply with international human rights law? Scholars have looked to domestic politics to suggest a constituency-driven domestic compliance mechanism. However, it is unclear if strong public support for compliance leads to greater willingness to comply among elected officials. This study is the first to empirically demonstrate the complete causal chain of a constituency-driven domestic compliance mechanism. Using a survey experiment, this study first finds that a strong state commitment to UN Norms on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations (RTNC) increases public support for compliance. Using a parallel lab-in-the-field experiment of sitting legislators, the study then finds that a strong state commitment to RTNC is similarly associated with increased elite support for compliance. Finally, the study finds that public demand for compliance is associated with even greater elite support for compliance. Public demand for compliance seems to elicit elite willingness to comply by raising reputational concerns.