Democratic Justice Party

Not to be confused with Justice Party (South Korea).

The Democratic Justice Party (DJP; Korean: 민주정의당; RR: Minjujeonguidang) was the ruling party of South Korea from 1981 to 1990.

Democratic Justice Party 민주정의당 民主正義黨
Leader	Chun Doo-hwan (1981–1985) Roh Tae-woo (1985–1990)
Founder	Chun Doo-hwan
Founded	15 January 1981 (1981-01-15)
Dissolved	22 January 1990 (1990-01-22)
Preceded by	Democratic Republican Party (de facto) (factions)
Merged into	Democratic Liberal Party
Headquarters	Seoul, South Korea
Ideology	Conservatism (South Korean) Authoritarianism (until 1987)
Political position	Right-wing[1] Before 1987: Far-right[2]
National affiliation	Hanahoe
Colours	Sky blue Before 1987:   Dark blue
Party flag
Politics of South Korea Political parties Elections

Democratic Justice Party
Hangul	민주정의당
Hanja	民主正義黨
Revised Romanization	Minjujeonguidang
McCune–Reischauer	Minjuchŏngŭidang
DJP
Hangul	민정당
Hanja	民正黨
Revised Romanization	Minjeongdang
McCune–Reischauer	Minjŏngdang

History

Chun Doo-hwan had become the country's de facto leader after leading a military coup in December 1979, and was elected president in his own right in August 1980. Two months after taking office, he abolished all political parties, including Park Chung Hee's Democratic Republican Party, which had ruled the country since 1963, and with few viable constraints on its power since Park's self-coup of 1971. A new Constitution, which inaugurated the Fifth Republic, was enacted later in October.

The following January, Chun created the Democratic Justice Party, which garnered the support of most DRP lawmakers and politicians; for all intents and purposes it was the DRP under a new name. He was elected as the first president of the Fifth Republic in 1981. Although the DJP won large majorities at legislative elections in 1981 and 1985 and the system was heavily rigged in its favor, it had far less power than the DRP.

The 1980 Constitution limited the president to a single seven-year term, with no possibility of reelection. Chun announced his retirement in 1987, but resisted all calls to further open up the regime. The situation changed later in 1987, when DJP presidential candidate Roh Tae-woo promised that year's presidential election would be free and democratic. Roh became the first direct elected president under a free and fair election in December 1987. In 1990, the DJP merged with Kim Young-Sam's Reunification Democratic Party and Kim Jong-pil's New Democratic Republican Party to form the Democratic Liberal Party.

Ideologies

At its founding convention held on January 15, 1981, the Democratic Justice Party presented five principles as its official founding ideology: nation, democracy, justice, welfare, and peaceful unification.^[3] The party embraced various ideologies like National conservatism,^[4] State-led developmentalism,^[5] Market liberalism,^[6] Neoliberalism,^[7] Economic liberalization,^[5][8] Anti-communism,^[9] Social justice^[9][8] and Authoritarianism (until 1987).^[10]

Election results

President

Election	Candidate	Votes	%	Result
1981	Chun Doo-hwan	4,755	90.23	Elected
1987	Roh Tae-woo	8,282,738	36.64	Elected

Legislature

Election	Leader	Votes	%	Seats				Position	Status
				Constituency	Party list	Total	+/–
1981	Chun Doo-hwan	5,776,624	35.64	90 / 184	61 / 92	151 / 276	new	1st	Government
1985		7,040,811	35.25	87 / 184	61 / 92	148 / 276	3		Government
1988	Roh Tae-woo	6,675,494	33.96	87 / 224	38 / 75	125 / 299	23		Government

Notes