4 in 10 People "Don't Trust the Courts"... Trust in Police at 20%

Trust in the courts down 5 percentage points from April 2025
CIO: 24%; Public Prosecution Office: 25%; National Police Agency: 29%

A poll found that 4 to 5 out of every 10 people do not trust the courts. Trust in the Constitutional Court also declined compared with April 2025, while trust in investigative agencies, including the Corruption Investigation Office for High-ranking Officials (CIO) and the National Police Agency, remained in the 20% range.

Yonhap News reported this on November 6, citing a poll released by Gallup Korea in the first week of November. Gallup Korea conducted the survey from November 3 to 5 among 1,001 people aged 18 or older nationwide. The poll was conducted through telephone interviews with surveyors using randomly selected wireless phone numbers. The margin of error was ±3.1 percentage points at a 95% confidence level, and the response rate was 9.7%.

The survey found that 41% of respondents said they trusted the courts, while 47% said they did not. Another 12% declined to state an opinion. Compared with the poll conducted in April 2025, trust in the courts fell by 5 percentage points, while distrust rose by 3 percentage points.

The Supreme Court in Seocho-dong, Seoul. A poll found that four to five out of every 10 people do not trust the courts. Yonhap News Agency

By party affiliation, 52% of supporters of the Democratic Party of Korea and 48% of supporters of the People Power Party said they did not trust the courts. Among supporters of the Rebuilding Korea Party, distrust of the courts reached 83%.

Trust in the Constitutional Court was higher than trust in the courts but remained below half. A total of 49% of respondents said they trusted the Constitutional Court, while 36% said they did not. Compared with the April 2025 poll, conducted when former President Yoon Suk Yeol was impeached, trust fell by 12 percentage points and distrust rose by 5 percentage points.

Assessments of agencies involved in investigation and prosecution were also negative. The CIO had the lowest trust rating among the institutions surveyed, with 24% expressing trust and 58% expressing distrust. The Public Prosecution Office, launched after the abolition of the Prosecutors' Office, received 25% trust and 50% distrust, while the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency received 29% trust and 49% distrust. For the National Police Agency, only 29% said they trusted it, while 57% said they did not.

Distrust was more common than trust even toward newly launched institutions such as the Serious Crimes Investigation Agency and the Public Prosecution Office. This points to low public assessments not only of the judiciary but also of investigative and prosecutorial agencies overall.

Meanwhile, views of this year's National Assembly audit were also predominantly negative. Only 15% said the audit had achieved results, while 46% said it had not. Another 39% declined to give an opinion. The most common reason for saying it had achieved nothing, cited by 22%, was that it had involved “nothing but attacks on opponents, political bickering, and fighting.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.