Chun Jung Bae

Few campaign operatives can boast that they saved the political bacon of a president twice. But Chun Jung Bae can confidently make that claim. It was Chun who started rallying support behind maverick politician Roh Moo Hyun's bid for the presidency and helped organize the youth campaign that ended with Roh's surprise victory in the December, 2002, balloting. And it was Chun again who led this year's legislative campaign that brought Roh's Uri Party up from a small minority to a majority in parliament. Now the 49-year-old, three-term lawmaker finds himself the head of the ruling party's congressional bloc and in a strong position to completely revamp South Korea's graft-infested political system.

Chun is a unique political breed in Korea. He doesn't have the charisma of former Presidents Kim Dae Jung and Kim Young Sam, whose dominating influence allowed them to run their political parties like their own fiefdoms. Chun is also too old to belong to the so-called "386" generation that took to the streets as student activists in the 1980s to fight for democracy against military dictatorship. (The "3" refers to their status as thirty-somethings, the "8" to their university days in the 1980s and the "6" to the 1960s, when most of them were born.) But when it comes to upholding political principles and pushing for institutional change, Chun is second to none. His refusal to compromise with the corrupt political establishment spurred reform-oriented lawmakers to rally around him in May to elect him as the party's parliamentary leader.