On 4 April, South Korea’s Constitutional Court unanimously ruled to remove the impeached President Yoon Suk-yeol from office for what it described as having “violated the constitutional order and posed a serious threat to the democratic republic”.

The decision marked only the second presidential impeachment in the country’s constitutional history. Yet, unlike the near-consensual removal of Park Geun-hye in 2017, this verdict came amid suffocating social tension, fuelled by weeks of far-right mobilisation, institutional defiance, and deep political polarisation. This time, the conflict was not merely about a corrupt leader – it was about the survival of constitutional democracy and even conservatism itself. South Korea now stands at a precarious juncture, confronting a far-right wave emboldened under Yoon’s presidency and the lingering structural crises that enabled it.

Yoon’s impeachment did not come out of nowhere. It can be traced back to 3 December 2024, when he declared martial law in response to what he called “government paralysis” following the ruling party’s defeat in parliamentary elections. While his justifications shifted — from safeguarding South Korea’s liberal democracy from “ pro-North, anti-state forces” to countering foreign-backed “ election interference” — the core logic remained: delegitimising democratic opposition and reframing political defeat as a national crisis. Though martial law was lifted shortly thereafter by South Korea’s National Assembly, Yoon continued to cast himself as the last bulwark against tyranny. For nearly four months, he nurtured a conspiracy-fuelled, far-right base that stormed courts, threatened judges, and labelled impeachment a foreign plot.

What distinguished this episode from 2017 was not only the president’s actions, but the ruling People Power Party’s response. Rather than distancing itself from an embattled leader, the PPP rallied behind Yoon, echoing his claims and courting the far-right groups that supported him. While a few lawmakers, such as Kim Ye-ji and later Kim Sang-wook, supported impeachment in December 2024, the party as a whole remained unified in its defiance – unlike the fractured conservative bloc during Park Geun-hye’s impeachment. High-profile figures like Hong Jun-pyo and Cho Bae-sook even called for the abolition of the Constitutional Court, while Na Kyung-won amplified conspiracy theories about Chinese nationals in the court by proposing legislation to restrict the appointment of foreign nationals to the Constitutional Court. In doing so, the PPP completed a decisive turn toward the radical right – a shift not seen since South Korea’s democratisation in 1987.

This shift wasn’t an isolated miscalculation, but the result of decades of crisis in conservative politics. Since the 1997 financial crisis, conservatives have framed their electoral setbacks as an existential threat, rather than a routine alternation of power. Each defeat — Kim Dae-jung’s election and in office (1998-2003), the failure to impeach Roh Moo-hyun in 2004, and Park Geun-hye’s removal in 2017 — was met not with reflection, but with intensified rhetoric about a crisis of South Korea’s conservatism. The result was the rise of a reactionary politics that merged economic nostalgia, anti-communist sentiment, and religious fundamentalism. Far-right forces, once marginal, gained ground through rallies, churches and online networks. They were not merely reacting to progressive victories, but to a broader sense of displacement amid economic precarity, demographic change, and cultural liberalisation.

Two key demographics illustrate this displacement: a forgotten generation of elderly citizens and an angry generation of young men. For many older Koreans, who experienced the rapid transformations of post-war modernisation, the collapse of traditional social structures and inadequate welfare have led to marginalisation. South Korea has the highest elderly poverty rate in the OECD, and this generation now sees itself as abandoned by the very society it helped build. Meanwhile, many young men — facing stagnant wages, job insecurity, and mandatory military service — have grown increasingly resentful of feminism and have drifted toward more conservative views. They feel outpaced, not only economically, but symbolically, by a society they perceive as leaving them behind. Together, these groups form the backbone of a reactionary movement that translates personal frustration into nationalistic rage.

This emotional energy has been harnessed by a growing network of far-right actors. One symbol of this mobilisation was a “ Captain Korea” cosplayer – a man who spread misinformation amplified by far-right media while appearing at rallies dressed as the American superhero. His false claims were later cited by Yoon’s legal team as evidence to justify the martial declaration. This case, though seemingly absurd, exemplifies the disturbing convergence of populist politics, disinformation, and a far-right spectacle. What matters is not the truth of these claims, but their utility in framing a broader story of national betrayal and restoration.

Religion, one of the “ seven pillars” of South Korean conservatism, has played a central role in driving this shift. Conservative Protestant churches, particularly evangelicals aligned with the US, have become key platforms for far-right activism. Mobilising around anti-LGBT rhetoric and Cold War anti-communism, they offer an emotionally charged, theologically justified framework for rejecting liberal politics. Jeon Kwang-hoon, a far-right pastor, held rallies praising Yoon Suk=yeol, using the slogan “Save Korea” as the central message. He rejected the court’s ruling on Yoon’s impeachment and called on his followers to mobilise 30 million people in resistance. In addition, events like the “ Taegeukgi rallies” combine patriotic symbols, religious hymns, and political slogans, creating a space where personal faith and nationalist politics reinforce each other. Unlike the spontaneous liberal protests of 2016–17, such as the anti-Park Geun-hye candlelight vigils, these movements have proven more enduring. They are not merely political demonstrations, but sustained communities built on shared grievance and moral conviction.

The PPP’s alliance with such groups is a dangerous gamble. In trying to salvage its power, the party has legitimised actors who reject the basic tenets of democratic governance. This move mirrors trends in the US Republican Party, where a similar embrace of far-right extremism has eroded institutional norms and intensified political polarisation. The impeachment of Yoon may have halted a descent into autocracy, but it has not resolved the deeper crisis: the mainstreaming of far-right ideologies, the collapse of a moderate conservative alternative and the failure of progressives to build a broad, inclusive coalition.

The Democratic Party under Lee Jae-myung now faces its own test. In a bid to win over centrist voters, Lee declared during the MBC presidential primary debate on 18 April a shift from progressive to centrist-conservative positioning. While this may win elections, it risks further weakening the country’s progressive forces and leaving no serious alternative to a radicalised right. The political space once occupied by reformists, feminists and democratisation advocates risks narrowing to the point of invisibility, squeezed by a possibly unforgiving realignment.

What happens next depends not only on elites but on the public. As the Constitutional Court acknowledged, it was citizen resistance and institutional non-compliance — particularly among the police and military — that thwarted Yoon’s self-coup. Over the past four months, ordinary Koreans demonstrated that the country’s democratic spirit remains resilient. Yet, resilience alone is not enough. The structures that produced this crisis — neoliberal inequality, generational alienation, polarising issues of gender equality and a radicalised religious right — remain firmly in place.

South Korea is not simply choosing its next president; it is choosing what kind of political community it wishes to be. If the far-right continues to dominate conservative politics and if progressives retreat too far from principled positions in the name of expediency, the country risks entering a prolonged period of instability and erosion of democratic norms.

The impeachment of Yoon was a constitutional necessity. But it was only the beginning of a much longer and harder struggle – to rebuild trust in institutions, to rein in political extremism, and to ensure that constitutional democracy remains more than just a legal framework, but a lived reality. In that struggle, the courage of citizens may again prove to be South Korea’s greatest defence.