Advanced, sure, but the leadership has always been dodgy. They've had seven leaders since 1993 (before which they really did have a military junta in power). T

Advanced, sure, but the leadership has always been dodgy. They've had seven leaders since 1993 (before which they really did have a military junta in power). Three of them ended up impeached or jailed for corruption or wrongthink [0], a fourth has just attempted to use the military to crack down on the opposition. This is more like what I expect from Argentina or Brazil than a fully fledged democracy with peaceful transitions of power, say France. That said, the Economist has it at #22 on its Democracy Index [1], one of the worst "full democracies" but ahead of France #23, USA #29, Brazil #51. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_Korea https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_South_Korea [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Economist_Democracy_Index