This article advocates the use of a“global conjunctural frame” (Hart 2020) to explore the martial law crisis provoked by the actions of South Korean President Yoon Seok-yeol in December 2024. It does so by tracking ongoing discussions among progressive intellectuals in South Korea and the contributors to this thematic section about the nature of Yoon’s attempted self-coup and the structures that enabled it with a focus on how the event and its aftermath resonates with notions of late or untimely forms of fascism. The article shows how far-right reactions involve a disturbing reworking of an enduring Cold War politics across global, national, and everyday scales to amplify resentments and antagonisms brought apart partly through structural changes associated with neoliberalism. It then reviews some of the ideas about the creation of a Seventh Republic that have emerged during Yoon’s impeachment and that advocate constitutional reforms to address this troubling conjuncture and recognize the new solidarities formed in defending democracy in South Korea.