Socialist Party (South Korea)

Socialist Party is a minor left-wing political party in South Korea, founded in 1998. It advocates an ideology of socialism, social republicanism, peace and environmentalism.

History
The Victory of People 21 (국민승리21) party (later DLP) was formed as a preparation of South Korean presidential election, 1997. It was an attempt to unite the progressivists in South Korea, but some progressivists focusing on class struggle didn't agree to the policy line of VoP21 - they thought there was an excess of nationalism in VoP21. For example, the slogan of Kwon Young-ghil, the presidential candidate of VoP21, was "Stand up, Korea!" ("일어나라 코리아!"). After the election, these progressivists formed Youth Progressive Party (청년진보당).

The Youth Progressive Party ran for election of National Assembly in Guro-gu local constituency, and gained 4.1% of votes. In August 2001, the party changed its name to Socialist Party under the slogan of "Against Capitalism, Against WPK", aiming some nationalists called NL(National Liberation) in DLP.

The party has changed its name to Hope Socialist Party (희망사회당) in April 2006, and to Korea Socialist Party (한국사회당) in October 2006 due to the Korean law forbidding the usage of a party name for four years when registration is canceled.

In 2008 General Election, the party got votes less than 3% and the national election committee canceled its registration. In November, the party registered again with the name of Socialist Party.

Elections
For several times, the Party has run candidates for President or Parliament (e.g. Kim Yeong-Gyu in the presidential election, 2002) but has never won any elections.

For the 2007 presidential election, Geum Min ran as the party's candidate for president. He proposed the idea of social republicanism, now adapted as a plank on the party's platform.