ABSTRACT
The function of proportional representational (PR) election systems is to produce as accurate a representation as possible of the distribution of party preferences in the population as a whole. South Korea has had a decades-long history of majoritarian-style voting systems until, in 2004, a parallel two-ballot mixed-member majoritarian (MMM) system was introduced for the general elections for the first time as a way of more appropriately accounting for the will of the voters. However, the share of PR seats was limited to less than a fifth of the National Assembly's total seats, and despite consensus on extending it to promote the quality of democracy, up till now repeated reform attempts have only failed, while the number of seats allocated through the second ballot has actually decreased. The question therefore arises as to how this can be explained. Against this backdrop, this study investigates the processes leading up to and following the 2019 electoral law reform as the latest attempt at improving South Korea's electoral system. Drawing on the ‘barriers approach’ ( Rahat and Hazan, 2011 ), the investigation examines the electoral reform's process, contents, and outcomes to shed light on what keeps Korea's electoral system and representative democracy in a state of disproportion.
