Is Regional Animus in Decline in Korea? A Test of the Generational Difference and Geographical Mobility Hypothesis

Since the 1987 democratic reform, regional attitudes toward the two southern provinces have been regarded as the most significant determinant of South Korean voters’ political preferences. In recent years, however, many scholars have speculated that regional animus is losing its ground as a basis for political judgment and will eventually be replaced by other politically relevant factors such as political ideology and issue preference. Others raise questions about the validity of this kind of “revisionist” argument, noting that election outcomes remain regionally divided. Adopting the implicit association test (IAT) as a measure of regional attitudes, we provide an empirical test to measure the effects of the emergence of new generations and geographical mobility in South Korean voters’ regional attitudes. Our results show that younger Korean voters are less regionally biased toward either of the two southern provinces. The only exception was the younger generation in the Honam region: they held even higher levels of animus toward Yeongnam than their older counterparts. Geographical mobility also seems to decrease regional bias. Those who have relocated to other provinces showed less regional bias when compared with the natives of Yeongnam and Honam still residing in their respective regions. Likewise, our results show that the inter-generational transfer of regional animus is not overwhelming. For the descendants of Yeongnam or Honam natives residing in another province, their family’s region of origin mattered little. In short, our findings suggest that changing generational composition and geographical mobility are likely to lessen the severity of regional animus and the political significance of regional attitudes will wane.