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Article: Reviewing President Kim's 2 Years; Crisis Plus Two: Coping With Reform.
- Article from:
- Korea Times (Seoul, Korea)
- Article date:
- February 20, 2000
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How does a government acquire political legitimacy? Very often it is through the means by which they come to power. Normally in today's world these would involve elections, but in some cases even the overthrow of a particularly heinous or corrupt government might be treated by its people as legitimating. Consider the Korean Student Revolution of 1960. Economic efficacy is also normally one aspect of the complex legitimacy equation; sometimes it is primary, but it varies by country, culture, and time.
But there are regimes in which economics are subservient to politics, where the government will impoverish the people if they can justify those actions in ...