A survey by the Pew Research Center confirms a trend that began before the COVID-19 pandemic. Answers tend to reflect a country's economy and performance by the incumbent government. In both Japan and South Korea, the top political leaders show lowest approval rates ever.
Washington (AsiaNews) – Dissatisfaction with democracy is growing in high-income countries; in Asia, Japan and South Korea top the list, this according to a recent report released today by the Pew Research Center.
Every year, the US-based think tank conducts surveys to measure the level of satisfaction towards the democracy in different countries, with tens of thousands of respondents.
A negative trend emerged in 2017 in a small group of 12 advanced democracies, growing steadily until the COVID-19 pandemic. After showing a slight improvement in 2021, the negative trend took off again.
In South Korea, satisfaction with democracy fell by 17 percentage points, from 53 in 2021 to 36 per cent in 2024. In Japan, the drop was smaller, from 38 per cent in 2021 to 31 per cent over the same period.
In none of the 12 democracies surveyed, Pew points out, satisfaction with democracy increased.
To broaden the comparison with the rest of the region, the Center surveyed 19 other countries this year.
In Asia, big differences exist from country to country. More than three-quarters of Indians (77 per cent) and Singaporeans (80 per cent) are happy with the way their democracy operates (in India, the data was collected before the recent elections).
In Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines, dissatisfaction does not exceed 50 per cent. While in Sri Lanka the percentage of dissatisfied stands at 58 per cent against 38 per cent of those who say they are satisfied.
Pew found that what people think about democracy is closely linked to what they think about the economy; if they evaluate it negatively, they are more likely to view the other the same way.
The political orientation of the interviewees also plays a role in the assessment. Government supporters tend to have a positive opinion of democracy compared to those who prefer the opposition.
This is the case for both Japan and South Korea whose data cannot be read in isolation from attitudes towards the government.
According to a recent poll, support for Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, due to scandals over fundraising by some party members, has fallen again over the last month, to 21 per cent, the lowest figure ever recorded since Kishida came to power in 2021.
In September, Japan’s conservative Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) will hold internal elections to choose who will lead it (and become prime minister), but public attention is currently focused on Tokyo’s gubernatorial race next Sunday (7 July) because the voters in the capital tend to set the trend for the national vote. Some 14 million people live in Metro Tokyo and the Tokyo Metropolitan government administers an annual budget of over 16 trillion yen (US$ 100 billion).
According to various observers, a victory by the LDP-backed incumbent Governor, Yuriko Koike, against the main opposition candidate, Renho Murata, which is supported by the Constitutional Democratic Party, cannot be taken for granted.
In South Korea, support for President Yoon Suk-yeol is around 20 per cent, the lowest figure ever recorded by a president of the Sixth Republic (established in 1988, after the end of the dictatorship) in his second year in office.
In last April’s parliamentary elections, voters rejected Yoon’s People Power Party, which managed to win only 108 seats in the National Assembly against the 187 won by the opposition Democratic Party.
In this case, the president’s standing has been penalised by a series of scandals, in particular one involving his wife, Kim Keon-hee, and this is reflected in the Pew survey.
Of those who expressed disapproval of Yoon, 19 per cent expressed dissatisfaction with the economy, high inflation, and poor standards of living, while 15 per cent cited the president's poor communication with the public.