SEOUL -- Campaigning for the March 9 South Korean presidential election has kicked off. Opinion polls show that Yoon Suk Yeol of the conservative opposition People Power Party is narrowly leading Lee Jae-myung of the governing Democratic Party. What does big data, which predicted Donald Trump's victory in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, say about the race?
In a Gallup Korea poll released on Feb. 18, the approval rating for Yoon stood at 41%, followed by Lee with 34%. Ahn Cheol-soo of the centrist opposition People's Party came a distant third with 11%. Most other opinion polls released by Feb. 21 showed Yoon over Lee by several percentage points, though their positions were reversed in some surveys.
