2008 South Korean legislative election

Legislative elections were held in South Korea on April 9, 2008.^[1] The conservative Grand National Party won 153 of 299 seats while the main opposition United Democratic Party won 81 seats.^[2] This election marked the lowest-ever voter turnout of 46%.^[3]

2008 South Korean legislative election

← 2004 9 April 2008 2012 →
← outgoing members elected members →
All 299 seats to the National Assembly 150 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	46.08% (15.55pp; Const. votes) 46.08% (15.55pp; PR votes)
Majority party Minority party Third party   Leader Kang Jae-seop Son Hak-gyu Suh Chung-won Party Grand National United Democratic Pro-Park Last election 121 seats[a] 161 seats[b] Did not exist Seats won 153 81 14 Seat change 32 80 New Constituency vote 7,478,776 4,977,508 637,351  % and swing 43.45% (5.55pp) 28.92% (20.16pp) 3.70% (New) Regional vote 6,421,727 4,313,111 2,258,750  % and swing 37.48% (1.71pp) 25.18% (21.05pp) 13.18% (New)   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Lee Hoi-chang Chon Young-sae Han Myeon-hee Party Liberty Forward Democratic Labor Creative Korea Last election Did not exist 10 seats Did not exist Seats won 18 5 3 Seat change New 5 3 Constituency vote 984,751 583,665 72,803  % and swing 5.72% (New) 3.39% (0.92pp) 0.42% (New) Regional vote 1,173,463 973,445 651,993  % and swing 6.85% (New) 5.68% (7.35pp) 3.81% (New)
Speaker before election Lim Chae-jung Uri Elected Speaker Kim Hyong-o Grand National

Electoral system

See also: Legislative elections in South Korea

The election was held under parallel voting, with 245 members elected in single-member constituencies via first-past-the-post voting and the remainder elected via proportional representation. Proportional seats were only available to parties which one three percent of the national valid vote among seat-allocated parties and/or won five or more constituency seats.

Political parties

See also: List of political parties in South Korea

Parties		Leader	Ideology	Seats		Status
				Last election	Before election
	United Democratic Party	Han Myeong-sook	Liberalism	152 / 299 [c]	141 / 299	Government
				9 / 299 [d]
	Grand National Party	Kang Jae-seop	Conservatism	121 / 299	117 / 299	Opposition
	United Liberal Democrats	Kim Nak-seong		4 / 273	Dissolved
	Liberty Forward Party	Lee Hoi-chang		Did not exist	10 / 299
	Democratic Labor Party	Kwon Young-ghil	Progressivism	10 / 299	7 / 299
	Pro-Park Alliance	Suh Chung-won	Conservatism	Did not exist	3 / 299
	Creative Korea Party	Han Myeon-hee	Centrist reformism	Did not exist	1 / 299

As of April 9, 2008, there were six political parties represented in the 18th National Assembly of South Korea, in addition to independents:

• Grand National Party (한나라당, Hannara-dang), led by Kang Jae-seop. The current major conservative party within the National Assembly. (153 seats won)
• United Democratic Party (통합민주당, Tongham Minju-dang), led by Son Hak-gyu. The current major liberal party within the National Assembly. (81 seats won)
• Liberty Forward Party (자유선진당, Jayu Seonjin-dang), led by Lee Hoi-chang. The Chungcheong Region-strongholder and current second conservative party within the National Assembly against the GNP. (18 seats won)
• Pro-Park Alliance (친박연대, Chin-bak Yeon-dae), led by Seo Cheong-won, although their inspirational leader is former GNP leader Park Geun-hye. A conservative coalition with Park Geun-hye within the National Assembly that broke away from the GNP after a dispute on the GNP's candidate nomination, which happened just before the election. (14 seats won)
• Democratic Labor Party (민주노동당, Minju Nodong-dang), led by Chun Young-se. A minor but the most progressive party within the 18th National Assembly, against both the Grand Nationals and Democrats. (5 seats won)
• Creative Korea Party (창조한국당, Changjo Hanguk-dang), led by Moon Kook-hyun. A minor but pro-environmental liberal party within the National Assembly, against the Grand Nationals. (3 seats won)
• (no seats) The New Progressive Party, led by Sim Sang-jeong and Roh Hoe-chan, won 2.94% votes but not enough to gain any seats. The New Progressive Party split from the Democratic Labor Party as a reaction to nationalism after the 2007 presidential elections.

Results

Main article: List of members of the National Assembly (South Korea), 2008–2012

5 81 3 18 14 153 25
Party		Proportional			Constituency			Total seats	+/–
		Votes	%	Seats	Votes	%	Seats
	Grand National Party	6,421,727	37.48	22	7,478,776	43.45	131	153	+32
	United Democratic Party	4,313,645	25.18	15	4,977,508	28.92	66	81	–80
	Pro-Park Alliance	2,258,750	13.18	8	637,351	3.70	6	14	New
	Liberty Forward Party	1,173,463	6.85	4	984,751	5.72	14	18	New
	Democratic Labor Party	973,445	5.68	3	583,665	3.39	2	5	–5
	Creative Korea Party	651,993	3.81	2	72,803	0.42	1	3	+3
	New Progressive Party	504,466	2.94	0	229,500	1.33	0	0	0
	Christian Party [ko]	443,775	2.59	0	3,720	0.02	0	0	0
	Party for Peaceful Unification and Family	180,857	1.06	0	334,715	1.94	0	0	New
	Party for Displaced People and National Security	93,554	0.55	0	1,130	0.01	0	0	New
	Socialist Party	35,496	0.21	0				0	0
	Party for Culture and Art	33,966	0.20	0				0	New
	Party for Citizen	17,656	0.10	0				0	New
	United Vocational Party	16,622	0.10	0	881	0.01	0	0	New
	Neo-Future Party	12,122	0.07	0				0	New
	People's Association for Salvation				513	0.00	0	0	New
	Unification Party				51	0.00	0	0	New
	Independents				1,907,326	11.08	25	25	+23
Total		17,131,537	100.00	54	17,212,690	100.00	245	299	0
Valid votes		17,131,537	98.37		17,212,690	98.83
Invalid/blank votes		284,383	1.63		202,976	1.17
Total votes		17,415,920	100.00		17,415,666	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		37,796,035	46.08		37,796,035	46.08
Source: NEC, CLEA, IPU

Constituency results by city/province

Constituency results by city/province

Region	GNP		UDP		Pro-Park		LFP		DLP		CKP		Ind.	Total seats
	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats	%	Seats
Seoul	40	51.2	7	37.1	0	1.9	0	2.3	0	2.0	1	1.6	0	48
Busan	11	47.3	1	11.8	1	9.2	0	2.8	0	4.3	–		5	18
Daegu	8	61.1	0	0.8	3	15.7	0	2.7	0	1.8	–		1	12
Incheon	9	48.0	2	31.6	–		0	4.8	0	3.4	0	0.4	1	12
Gwangju	0	6.1	7	64.7	–		0	0.1	0	7.7	–		1	8
Daejeon	0	26.6	1	24.0	0	4.4	5	40.0	0	0.8	0	0.4	0	6
Ulsan	5	53.4	0	2.3	0	5.5	–		0	18.3	–		1	6
Gyeonggi	32	48.3	17	37.0	1	3.8	0	2.4	0	2.8	0	0.1	1	51
Gangwon	3	44.8	2	24.6	–		0	8.4	0	2.9	0	0.3	3	8
North Chungcheong	1	39.5	6	35.3	0	3.6	1	14.1	0	2.3	0	0.3	0	8
South Chungcheong	0	30.1	1	14.3	0	1.5	8	46.4	0	1.1	0	0.3	1	10
North Jeolla	0	7.2	9	54.7	–		–		0	1.3	–		2	11
South Jeolla	0	6.1	9	61.8	–		0	0.1	0	4.8	–		3	12
North Gyeongsang	9	54.3	0	3.1	1	6.1	0	2.0	0	1.1	–		5	15
South Gyeongsang	13	51.4	1	8.5.	–		0	1.2	2	9.1	0	0.4	1	17
Jeju	0	34.4	3	41.8	0	1.4	0	3.4	0	5.6	–		0	3
Total	131	43.5	66	28.9	6	3.7	14	5.7	2	3.4	1	0.4	25	245

Party-list results by city/province

Party list vote results by city/province

Region	GNP	UDP	Pro-Park	LFP	DLP	CKP	Other
Seoul	40.2	28.3	10.4	4.8	3.8	4.6	7.8
Busan	43.5	12.7	22.6	5.2	5.3	3.8	6.9
Daegu	46.6	4.9	32.7	4.0	3.2	2.9	5.7
Incheon	39.7	24.6	10.9	6.1	5.8	4.4	8.6
Gwangju	5.9	70.4	1.3	0.9	9.4	3.9	8.2
Daejeon	24.8	18.6	8.7	34.3	3.9	3.7	6.1
Ulsan	42.9	9.3	18.7	3.4	14.2	3.5	8.0
Gyeonggi	40.9	26.4	11.4	4.7	4.8	4.4	7.3
Gangwon	45.5	18.6	12.3	6.3	5.9	3.7	7.6
North Chungcheong	34.0	23.9	12.3	13.7	5.7	3.4	7.0
South Chungcheong	27.1	13.5	7.2	37.8	4.7	2.5	7.1
North Jeolla	9.3	64.3	2.3	1.6	7.4	2.9	12.1
South Jeolla	6.4	66.9	1.8	1.1	10.1	2.3	11.5
North Gyeongsang	53.5	5.6	23.6	2.9	4.1	2.4	8.0
South Gyeongsang	45.0	10.5	18.0	4.2	10.6	3.4	8.2
Jeju	32.4	30.2	12.3	4.2	10.0	5.1	5.8
Overall total	37.5	25.2	13.2	6.8	5.7	3.8	7.8
Seat allocation	22	15	8	4	3	2	0

Notes

1. Grand National Party
2. Uri Party and Democratic Party
3. Uri Party
4. Democratic Party