The Benefit of the Wind: Testing the Rally Effect of North Korea Shocks during the Park Geun-hye Administration

The “rally-'round-the-flag effect” sparked by North Korea (the so-called ‘Northern Wind') has been an important part of South Korean domestic politics. Despite the long history and controversy associated with politics of Northern Wind, the literature provides surprisingly little quantitative evidence on this phenomenon. In this study, we empirically investigate the relationship between North Korean-induced incidents and former President Park Geun-hye's weekly job approval ratings. Using vector autoregressions, we find that (1) President Park gained political benefits from North Korea, where negative events (e.g., armed attacks) generated a larger boost in approval than positive events (e.g., high-level talks); (2) rally effects varied across regions according to different perceptions of the North Korean regime: during security crisis, Park received the largest rallies in Gyeongnam province where the dominant image of North Korea was an ‘enemy that threatens our safety'; and (3) a test of nuclear weapons or intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) did not affect approval ratings even though it captured widespread media attention.