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Demography, Early Voting, and Election Integrity in South Korea: Evidence Across Four Electoral Cycles

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  • Kim, Minseong

Abstract

Allegations of fraud in South Korean elections have centered primarily on the in-precinct early-voting channel, which consistently produces higher democratic Party vote shares than same-day ballots. We assess these claims using a unified framework applied to four elections spanning 2020-2025: the 21st General Election (2020), the 22nd General Election (2024), the 20th Presidential Election (2022), and the 21st Presidential Election (2025). First, we apply several forensic statistical tests - including simulation-adjusted second-digit Benford's law, last-digit uniformity, mixture-model fingerprinting, and evaluation of the widely-cited 63:37 early-vote ratio claim - and find no systematic pattern indicative of large-scale vote manipulation, while flagging a candidate-specific last-digit anomaly in the 2022 presidential election that warrants ongoing scrutiny. Second, we regress Democratic vote share and early-vote share on principal components derived from census, employment, and housing data at the sub-district (dong) level, with province-interacted election fixed effects and population-weighted least squares. Across all elections, sociodemographic characteristics explain 73-94% of the geographic variation in vote shares, and the same predictors perform equally well for early votes and same-day votes. For the 2025 presidential election - a three-candidate contest - we instrument the third-party candidate's vote share using the 2017 conservative-reform candidate's support, recovering a causal estimate of vote diversion. Our findings suggest that geographic patterns in early voting are well-explained by who votes early, not by when ballots are counted.

Suggested Citation

  • Kim, Minseong, 2026. "Demography, Early Voting, and Election Integrity in South Korea: Evidence Across Four Electoral Cycles," SocArXiv 5d94n_v1, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:socarx:5d94n_v1
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/5d94n_v1
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Fewster, R. M., 2009. "A Simple Explanation of Benford's Law," The American Statistician, American Statistical Association, vol. 63(1), pages 26-32.
    2. Deckert, Joseph & Myagkov, Mikhail & Ordeshook, Peter C., 2011. "Benford's Law and the Detection of Election Fraud," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(3), pages 245-268, July.
    3. Beber, Bernd & Scacco, Alexandra, 2012. "What the Numbers Say: A Digit-Based Test for Election Fraud," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 20(2), pages 211-234, April.
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