South Korea Breaking into the Big Leagues

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Roh, a quiet, unassuming man, at once set out to establish a modest administrative style, one quite different from the stern, autocratic ways of Chun, who favored elevated, thronelike chairs and sat at a separate desk when meeting with his Cabinet. Roh introduced round tables, which he shares with colleagues and visitors. In his campaign, Roh had insisted that despite his background as a soldier, he was, at heart, "an ordinary man."

A recent poll gave Roh a 53% approval rating, but his popularity so far has not transferred to his party. In the April National Assembly elections, the D.J.P. suffered a shocking defeat and was reduced to 125 seats, less than a majority in the 299-seat Assembly. Both Kim Young Sam and Kim Dae Jung, who resigned their party-leadership posts after the debacle of the presidential election, returned, phoenix-like, to the center of the political arena, heading their revived parties during the National Assembly elections.

Despite such encouraging signs, skeptics fret that the plague of authoritarianism has not been banished. "Those who benefited from the military dictatorship have retreated or made deals with the democratic forces," says opposition National Assemblyman Lee Chul. "Democracy is not deep rooted yet."

The military and intelligence services remain powerful and threatening. Last week seven military men, including two brigadier generals, were arrested in connection with an assault on a journalist. The chief of army intelligence, Major General Lee Kyu Hong, was relieved of his post on charges that he attempted to block an investigation of the incident. As long as Seoul believes, justifiably, that there is a military threat from North Korea, the South Korean armed forces are bound to maintain a strong influence. "The government of ((South)) Korea is a big ship, and you must change course slowly," says D.J.P. Assemblyman Nam Jae Hee. "The people know Roh is altering the direction gradually. That's enough." The opposition also knows that pushing Roh and the government too hard could cause a backlash in favor of the right.

Roh's political hand has been strengthened immeasurably by his country's seemingly unstoppable economy, which last year was the fastest growing in the world. South Korea's gross national product in 1987 topped $119 billion, and has risen at the staggering average annual rate of 8.8% for the past two decades. The country financed its fast expansion by running up a foreign debt that reached $47 billion by 1986. But in that same year South Korea registered a small current-account trade surplus, the first in its history, and last year expanded it to $7.7 billion. That overage has helped enable the country to reduce its foreign debt to a current level of $35 billion.