Republic of Korea Results Report 2021-2023

Implementation of Korea’s fifth action planAction plans are at the core of a government’s participation in OGP. They are the product of a co-creation process in which government and civil society jointly develop commitments to open governmen... strengthened legislative whistleblower protectionsEnsuring that people feel encouraged and safe to report corrupt practices or wrongdoing in the workplace builds a culture of integrity and makes it easier to detect corruption.  Technical specificati.... The government also launched an online system for citizen petitions, engaged youthRecognizing that investing in youth means investing in a better future, OGP participating governments are creating meaningful opportunities for youth to participate in government processes. Technical ... in policymaking, and provided access to information on government safety inspections. However, the change in administration and shift in policy priorities contributed to a reduction overall in civic participation opportunities.

Early ResultsEarly results refer to concrete changes in government practice related to transparency, citizen participation, and/or public accountability as a result of a commitment’s implementation. OGP’s Inde...

Four of 14 commitments in Korea’s action plan achieved moderate early results. CommitmentOGP commitments are promises for reform co-created by governments and civil society and submitted as part of an action plan. Commitments typically include a description of the problem, concrete action... 6, identified as having the potential to realize the most promising results in the Action Plan Review, moderately strengthened legislative whistleblower protections. In addition, Commitment 1 went beyond its planned milestones to engage youth participation in government ministries and committees, Commitment 3 launched an online system for citizen petitions, and Commitment 12 eased access to information on government safety inspection results. Despite successful implementation, the remaining ten commitments did not produce notable open government results. This was largely due to weaknesses in the ambitionAccording to OGP’s Articles of Governance, OGP commitments should “stretch government practice beyond its current baseline with respect to key areas of open government.” Ambition captures the po... and open government relevanceAccording to the OGP Articles of Governance, OGP commitments should include a clear open government lens. Specifically, they should advance at least one of the OGP values: transparency, citizen partic... of their initial design. Four of these commitments ended with more limited access to civic participation opportunities. Under the new administration that came into office in May 2022, the government shrank budget allocation to participatory budgeting (Commitments 4.1 and 4.2) and suspended committees for institutionalized civil society participation in government decision making (Commitments 8 and 9). None of the action plan’s commitments achieved significant early results.

CompletionImplementers must follow through on their commitments for them to achieve impact. For each commitment, OGP’s Independent Reporting Mechanism (IRM) evaluates the degree to which the activities outlin...

All but one of the action plan’s 14 commitments were completely or substantially implemented, which is a similar rate to the previous action plan. This reflected an alignment between most of the commitments and existing government objectives. In many cases, commitments were implemented within the context of routine government activities. While this contributed to strong implementation, it limited early results in opening government. Commitment 9 saw limited implementation ,as the Civil Society Committee was suspended.

Participation and Co-Creation

The fifth action plan widened participation compared to previous action plan cycles. Korea’s OGP efforts were coordinated by its multistakeholder forum, the Open Government Committee (OGC, formerly Open Government Forum). The Vice Minister of Interior and Safety and Transparency International Korea co-chaired the committee. Its institutional framework was upgraded from ministerial to prime ministerial level. The action plan was developed through one and a half years of online engagement and mostly reflected government-proposed initiatives. Following the co-creation process, the OGC expanded to include academic and private sector representatives, although civil society representatives constituted a smaller portion of the committee than the previous co-creation process.[1] Following low level of civil society engagement in developing commitments, civil society participation in implementation varied across commitments. Compared to the previous cycle, the OGP website and repositoryAccess to relevant information is essential for enabling participation and ensuring accountability throughout the OGP process. An OGP repository is an online centralized website, webpage, platform or ... were more accessible and regularly updated with co-creation and OGC meeting records. To strengthen the OGP process, civil society could have a more active role in commitment development and implementation. Meanwhile, a more systematic and publicly reported monitoring of implementation would improve transparencyAccording to OGP’s Articles of Governance, transparency occurs when “government-held information (including on activities and decisions) is open, comprehensive, timely, freely available to the pub... More.

Implementation in Context

The change of administration in 2022 and accompanying shift in policy priorities had a dampening effect on the action plan’s open government results. In particular, civil society’s operating environment tightened, with a worsening score for civil society repression according to the Varieties of Democracy Index.[2] Restrictions of civil society organizations weaken their participation and ability to inform, mobilize, and represent the interests of the general public. An open operational environment for civil society is key to addressing the socio-economic challenges facing South Korea.

[1] The Open Government Committee for this action plan was composed of 8 government, 10 civil society, and 12 academia and private sectorGovernments are working to open private sector practices as well — including through beneficial ownership transparency, open contracting, and regulating environmental standards. Technical specificat... representatives. During the previous co-creation processCollaboration between government, civil society and other stakeholders (e.g., citizens, academics, private sector) is at the heart of the OGP process. Participating governments must ensure that a dive..., it was composed of 7 government and 13 civil society representatives. As of February 2024, OGC was reformulated to 23 members: 8 government, 14 academic and private sector representatives, and one civil society representative.

[2] According to the Varieties of Democracy Index (V-Dem), the Republic of Korea’s score for civil society repression worsened from 2.6 in 2021 to 0.88 in 2023 (0 being worst, 4 being best). See “V-Dem Dataset v14,” Varieties of Democracy Project, https://v-dem.net/data/the-v-dem-dataset.