A system improvement is being promoted to allow local government recommended personnel to participate in government committees, ensuring that regional opinions are more systematically reflected from the stage of national policy formulation. The Ministry of the Interior and Safety, the Ministry of Government Legislation, and the Council of Governors of Korea announced on the 16th that they had approved 20 presidential decree amendments to expand the participation of local officials in government committees at a cabinet meeting.
This amendment aims to establish an institutional foundation to reflect regional characteristics and on-site demands in national policy tasks that need to be discussed jointly by the central and local governments. This revision was promoted based on the discussions of the ‘National Policy and Legislative Participation Improvement Task Force (TF)’ formed by the Ministry of Government Legislation, the Council of Governors of Korea, and academia since August last year. The TF reviewed the relevance of local affairs among government committee agendas for a year and selected the legal grounds for 102 government committees where local officials’ participation is highly needed.
As a result, it was decided to revise 55 laws under the jurisdiction of 11 ministries, including the Ministry of Climate and Environment, and legislative procedures were carried out for 26 laws and 20 presidential decrees. At this cabinet meeting, 20 presidential decree amendments were approved, and 22 laws among the revised laws are currently submitted to the National Assembly for discussion. The amendments include provisions that local government-recommended personnel must participate as members in government committees discussing national tasks or policies requiring cooperation with local governments, such as the Central Environmental Policy Committee.
Jo Won-cheol, head of the Ministry of Government Legislation, stated that this amendment is significant as it establishes an institutional foundation for reflecting regional characteristics and on-site policy demands from the policy formation stage. Yoo Jeong-bok, head of the Council of Governors of Korea, said that the passage of the presidential decree amendments to expand local participation in government committees shows the increasing importance of local governments in national governance. Minister of the Interior and Safety Yoon Ho-jung expressed expectations that this amendment would enable local governments to participate more actively in major national policy decision-making processes.