| Country: | South Korea |
| Flag Year: | 1949 |
| Type: | legislative |
| Previous Election: | 1978 South Korean legislative election |
| Previous Year: | 1978 |
| Next Election: | 1985 South Korean legislative election |
| Next Year: | 1985 |
| Turnout: | 77.74% (0.66pp) |
| Seats For Election: | All 276 seats in the National Assembly |
| Majority Seats: | 139 |
| Election Date: | 25 March 1981 |
| Image1: | Chun Doo-hwan.png |
| Leader1: | Chun Doo-hwan |
| Party1: | Democratic Justice Party |
| Seats1: | 151 |
| Popular Vote1: | 5,776,624 |
| Percentage1: | 35.64% |
| Leader2: | Yu Chi-song |
| Party2: | Democratic Korea Party |
| Seats2: | 81 |
| Popular Vote2: | 3,495,829 |
| Percentage2: | 21.57% |
| Leader4: | Kim Jong-cheol |
| Party4: | Korean National Party |
| Seats4: | 25 |
| Popular Vote4: | 2,147,293 |
| Percentage4: | 13.25% |
| Party5: | Civil Rights Party (South Korea) |
| Seats5: | 2 |
| Popular Vote5: | 1,088,847 |
| Percentage5: | 6.72% |
| Speaker | |
| Before Election: | Dissolution of parliament |
| After Party: | Democratic Justice Party |
Legislative elections were held in South Korea on 25 March 1981.[1]
The result was a victory for the Democratic Justice Party, which won 151 of the 276 seats in the National Assembly. Voter turnout was 77.7%.
The election was held under the influence of Coup d'état of 1979 and 1980. Major opposition political figures like Kim Young-sam were barred from running. Kim Dae-jung was arrested on May 17, 1980, and was sentenced to death on a of "inciting rebellion". Even the Democratic Republican Party of the late president Park Chung-hee was forcibly dissolved, and major figures like Kim Jong-pil was barred from running.
The election, while ostensibly a multi-party election, is widely considered to have been a fraudulent one, with supposed "opposition" politicians being heavily vetted by the Agency for National Security Planning and the South Korean Army Security Command.
The new electoral system for the National Assembly abolished the president's power to appoint one-third of the chamber's members. Of the 276 seats, 184 were elected in two-member constituencies via single non-transferable vote, while the remainder were allocated via proportional representation at the national level among parties that won five or more seats in constituencies. Two-thirds of those seats would be awarded to the top party (which was then eliminated from further consideration for national seats), with the remainder allocated based on vote share.
| Region | Total seats | Seats won | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DJP | DKP | KNP | CRP | NPP | DSP | DFP | PPP | Ind. | |||
| Seoul | 28 | 14 | 11 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
| Busan | 12 | 6 | 5 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Gyeonggi | 24 | 12 | 10 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Gangwon | 12 | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| North Chungcheong | 8 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
| South Chungcheong | 16 | 8 | 5 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | |
| North Jeolla | 14 | 7 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| South Jeolla | 22 | 10 | 9 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | |
| North Gyeongsang | 26 | 13 | 1 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | |
| South Gyeongsang | 20 | 10 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 3 | |
| Jeju | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | |
| Constituency total | 184 | 90 | 57 | 18 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 11 | |
| PR list | 92 | 61 | 24 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | 276 | 151 | 81 | 25 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 11 | |