I’ve worked extensively in SK marketing and analytics before, and for whatever reason Koreans by and large have accepted chaebols. most do not want them gone.
we used to have a saying at work that SK took all the worst parts of American capitalism and ran with it. the society is heavily encouraged to look up to chaebols as examples of success. Korea’s marketing heavily emphasizes materialism in an on the nose way. societal elitism in Korea is part of their culture and they make it known they’re better than you if they’re in a higher social position than you.
you can see the chaebol dream if you’ve ever consumed any Korean media before. the trope of meeting a random person who ends up being a down to earth chaebol is one of the most typical, overplayed story lines in kdramas ever. and even before that, the trope of running into a random person who ends up being some down to earth prince trying to escape royalty was super common. more people fantasize about that kind of stuff there than despise it.
all this to say the chaebols almost aren’t the problem. they’re practically a symptoms of a society who glamorizes them. it feels like how the US felt about the rich in the early 2000s.