Constitutional Court strikes down ban on political activity by university faculty unions

[The Herald Business= Kim Young-chul] South Korea's Constitutional Court has ruled that a provision of the Teachers' Union Act prohibiting university professors' unions from engaging in political activity is unconstitutional.

The Constitutional Court on Thursday consolidated two constitutional complaints filed by the National Professors' Labor Union, the Korean Private University Professors' Labor Union and the Chung-Ang University Professors' Labor Union against the relevant provisions of Article 3 of the Teachers' Union Act, ruling 7-2 in favor of unconstitutionality.

University professors gained the right to form unions following a June 2020 amendment to the Teachers' Union Act. The original Article 2 of the act had defined "teachers" eligible to form unions solely as those under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, but a 2018 constitutional incompatibility ruling prompted lawmakers to expand the definition to include university faculty under the Higher Education Act.

The problem arose when that expansion subjected university faculty unions to Article 3 of the act, which prohibits teachers' unions from engaging in any political activity.

This created a contradiction: university faculty already enjoy broad political freedoms — including the right to run for public office — yet found themselves barred from political activity the moment they joined a union. In response, the National Professors' Labor Union and others filed consecutive constitutional complaints in August and September 2020, arguing that their rights to political expression and equality had been violated.

After roughly six years of deliberation, the court determined that extending the political activity ban to university faculty unions violates the Constitution.

"University faculty teach adult students and conduct academic research as their core duties, and the legal framework already reflects this distinction by permitting them — unlike elementary and secondary school teachers — to join political parties and engage in election campaigning," the court said.

The court also noted that under current law, university professors who organize as a union are barred from political activity, while the same professors organizing as a non-union association — or lecturers' groups — face no such restriction, creating unequal treatment.

"Current laws such as the Political Parties Act and the Public Official Election Act already broadly permit university faculty to engage in political activity as an exception, in recognition of their essential characteristics," the court said. "While conduct such as using one's position as a teacher to incite students to support or oppose a particular party or political faction cannot be permitted, all other political activity must be guaranteed to both university faculty unions and university faculty associations alike."

The court added that university faculty as individuals are already permitted strong forms of political activity — including joining political parties, running as candidates and campaigning — and no separate blanket prohibition exists for university faculty associations formed by the same individuals. It is therefore difficult to conclude that the mere fact of those same faculty members forming an association immediately heightens the risk to political neutrality in education.

Justices Kim Bok-hyeong and Jo Han-chang dissented, arguing that "the influence on universities and society that could result from fully permitting political activity by university faculty unions is far greater and more significant than in the case of university faculty associations," and that the provision banning political activity by university faculty unions does not violate the Constitution.

The Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union, known as Jeon'gyojo, welcomed the ruling and urged swift revision of the law.

In a verbal statement, the union said it "welcomes the Constitutional Court's ruling that Article 3 of the Teachers' Union Act, which prohibits professors' unions from engaging in political activity, is unconstitutional," and urged the Ministry of Employment and Labor and the National Assembly to immediately amend Article 3 of the Teachers' Union Act in line with the court's decision.

The union also stressed that political activity by unions of early childhood, elementary and secondary school teachers organized under the same Teachers' Union Act must likewise be permitted.