Kim Dae-jung

Kim Dae-jung left business for politics after the Korean War and joined the Democratic Party's reform wing. Through the 1960s to the 1980s he led the democratization movement against successive military regimes, surviving assassination attempts, a rigged car accident, imprisonment, house arrest, exile, and a death sentence. He lost presidential bids in 1971, 1987, and 1992 before finally winning in 1997 through an opposition alliance — the first time a non-ruling party candidate took the Blue House. He inherited the wreckage of the 1997 Asian financial crisis and steered South Korea through pr…