Photo: Gyeonggi-do Province office. Credit: Gyeonggi-do Province.
The presidential race between Lee Jae-myung 이재명 and Kim Mun-su 김문수 will mark the end of a longstanding truism in South Korean politics: Gyeonggi-do Province governors 경기도 도지사 cannot be the president. Lee was governor from 2018 to 2021; Kim served two terms in the same office from 2006 to 2014. Prior to this election, six of the seven Gyeonggi-do Province governors ran for presidency; all lost.
Although being the chief executive of South Korea’s most populous province automatically lends the governor a certain cachet and name recognition, the Seoul-centric nature of South Korean politics has made it difficult for any provincial governor to build an electoral machine capable of winning a national election. A victory by either Lee or Kim would break the streak - but only on a technicality, as both spent time in the national government. Lee became a legislator in the National Assembly 국회 and the chairman of the Democratic Party 민주당 당대표; Kim was a Labor Minister 노동부장관 under the Yoon Suk-yeol 윤석열 administration.
Fortunately, some things still can be counted on, such as the certainty that prime ministers 국무총리 cannot be presidents. Former prime minister Han Deok-su 한덕수 now joins eight other prime ministers on the ash-heap of failed presidential runs. Hwang Gyo-an 황교안 - a former prime minister under Park Geun-hye 박근혜 - is running as an independent, but his candidacy is a very long shot. Prime ministers tend to fail in their presidential ambitions for similar reasons to provincial governors: enmeshed within the bureaucracy, they lack the chance to develop a national electoral machine despite their name recognition.