The New Progressive Party (; NPP) was a political party in

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

. The New Progressive Party was established by a number of Democratic Labor Party members (known as 'People's Democracy Faction') who left the party in reaction to the dominating Minjokhaebang factions.

History

The first party president was

Roh Hoe-chan Roh Hoe-chan ( ko, 노회찬, 31 August 1956 – 23 July 2018) was a South Korean politician. He was a member of the 17th, 19th, and 20th National Assemblies. Roh was involved with multiple progressive-leaning parties, lately with the Justice ...

, who was elected at the 2004 Parliamentary election as a member of the Democratic Labor Party. The NPP failed to take seats in the

National Assembly In politics, a national assembly is either a unicameral legislature, the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or both houses of a bicameral legislature together. In the English language it generally means "an assembly composed of the repre ...

in the 2008 general election, despite Roh Hoe-chan being expected to win a seat, being that he was winning in most of the pre-vote surveys. In the 29 April 2009 by-election, the NPP looked to win a seat for the district of

Ulsan Ulsan (), officially the Ulsan Metropolitan City is South Korea's seventh-largest metropolitan city and the eighth-largest city overall, with a population of over 1.1 million inhabitants. It is located in the south-east of the country, neighboring ...

based on its pro-Labor population statistics. The NPP nominated Cho Seung-soo, former AM in Ulsan Buk-gu, 2005. The NPP negotiated with the Democratic Labor Party to nominate the Progressive sole candidate before the beginning of the by-election. The NPP and DLP finally negotiated the nomination of the candidate Cho Seung-soo to run against the conservative candidates. In the by-election, Cho beat the GNP (

Grand National Party The Liberty Korea Party () was a conservative political party in South Korea that was described variously as right-wing, right-wing populist, or far-right. Until February 2017, it was known as the Saenuri Party (), and before that as the Hanna ...

) candidate and the NPP finally took one seat. In the 2010 local government election of mayor of

Seoul Seoul (; ; ), officially known as the Seoul Special City, is the capital and largest metropolis of South Korea.Before 1972, Seoul was the ''de jure'' capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) as stated iArticle 103 ...

, NNP candidate Roh Hoe-chan received 3% of the vote. But, the Democratic Party's

Han Myung-sook Han Myeong-sook (born March 24, 1944; ko, 한명숙 ) was the Prime Minister of South Korea from April 2006 to March 2007. She is South Korea's first female prime minister (second female prime minister overall if the acting premiership of Chan ...

was just behind

Oh Se-hoon Oh Se-hoon (Korean: 오세훈, Hanja: 吳世勳; born January 4, 1961) is a South Korean politician who is currently the serving Mayor of Seoul since 8 April 2021. He also previously served as a member of the National Assembly of South Korea ...

for 1~2% so, whose supporters criticised him for not retiring. In 2011, Democratic Labor Party suggested to merge, but in referendum of party members, the proposal failed with 50% approval. Cho Seung-soo left the party, thus the New Progressive Party lost one seat in the Korean National assembly. In December 2011, a faction of the NPP, led by Sim Sang-jeong, left to join the

Unified Progressive Party The Unified Progressive Party (UPP; ko, 통합진보당, RR: ''Tonghap Jinbo-dang'', Hanja: 統合進步黨) is a banned political party in South Korea. It was founded on 5 December 2011 as a merger of the Democratic Labor Party, the People ...

. In 2012, the New Progressive Party proposed to unite with the

Socialist Party Socialist Party is the name of many different political parties around the world. All of these parties claim to uphold some form of socialism, though they may have very different interpretations of what "socialism" means. Statistically, most of th ...

. The Socialist Party agreed to unity at its last party congress on 19 February 2012, with a vote of 93% in favour. Both parties held a unity ceremony on 4 March 2012. Since NPP couldn't gain the 3% of proportional vote in 19th National Assembly Election held on 11 April 2012, party's status is now unregistered by South Korean law, which indicates which party couldn't gain 2% of votes in election will be deregistered automatically. Deregistration made the NPP to form a new party as a new leftist party which will represent Labor Party. On April 24, the party convened national committee (which now is private club level) and decided to form a 'New party forming committee', as the NPP was not allowed to use its current name until 2016.

Political position

The NPP aims for social democracy. The NPP criticizes both liberal-nationalism (mostly Minjudang-wing) and leftist-nationalism (mostly Minjokhaebang-wing). In particular, the NPP showed a more hostile tendency than South Korean

liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * a supporter of liberalism ** Liberalism by country * an adherent of a Liberal Party * Liberalism (international relations) * Sexually liberal feminism * Social liberalism Arts, entertainment and m ...

s when it comes to North Korea policy. For this reason, media in South Korea described the NPP as "anti-North Korean progressive". The NPP officially advocated

feminism Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social equality of the sexes. Feminism incorporates the position that society prioritizes the male po ...

from the party code. The NPP declared that it would become a "party for women", saying that there were not enough discourse on women's rights (including the DLP). The NPP was also the most active in the South Korean progressive camp at the time in the issue of

LGBT rights Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality. Notably, , 33 ...

. The party ran the "Sexual Politics Committee" (성정치위원회). Especially in 2008, the NPP put forward the coming out lesbian as a candidate for the National Assembly. (This was the 'first' case in relatively conservative South Korean political standards compared to other developed countries.)

Election results

Legislature

Local

References