Supposing you wake up tomorrow as Kim Jong-Il, or whoever the latest Great Leader is, what would you do to liberalize your economy so your people aren’t near total starvation on a daily basis, but without losing power?
Is the state strong enough to survive with liberalization? Wouldn’t more food and luxuries make him more popular, rather than worse? I know the French Revolution was triggered by food riots.
It is the same as a cult mentality. Us against THEM. Juche is all about self-reliance, even in a modern era where any rational nation should realize that total self-sufficiency is impossible and irrational. Our modern transportation infrastructure alone means that we have no need for famine even if there should be total crop failure in any one nation, as there will still be a surplus of food in other nations. North Korea’s foolish insistence on Juche dooms them to failure.
Me personally, if I woke up as Kim Jong-il, I’d purge and kill as many major figures as I could by dinner time, have a good meal and then put a bullet in my head. But that’s scifi, not reality.
The big problem is that, as above, they cannot possibly meet the needs of their populace. To do so would mean allowing large scale imports, which means not only dealing with the problems of being able to control which goods get into which hands, but the serious issue of paying for it. NK has precious little of value to export, and is crippled by sanctions brought about by their own behavior.
Unfortunately, solving most of these issues would require making peace with the United States and South Korea, and moving resources away from the long-standing “military first” doctrine, which will not sit well with the other major power figures. Frankly, I think doing this is just this side of impossible barring some extreme disaster such as a plague or large scale revolt of soldiers and population (which I also see as extremely unlikely).
So honestly, their only hope is to go back to the kind of very very minor capitalist farmers market reforms they killed last year (hoping the people trust they won’t yank the rug out from under them AGAIN) while deeply reigning in the acts of international provocation they’ve been prone to in the past.
I’d basically reach over (the 3 underage hookers in my bed) and grab the phone (trying not to disturb the mirror and lines of cocaine on my bed stand, knock over the bottles of booze or brake any of the syringes) and book an immediate flight out of the country, um, for a state visit…yeah, that’s it! And I’d get a bit of spending money while I was out there (by simply going into the 3rd closet on the right where I keep bundles of US $20’s and $50’s, normally used to feather my bed for the really wild parties and to bathe in).
That’s the whole plan really…because North Korea is a house of cards piled so high that the slightest breeze could bring it down. Or nothing at all. And know I’m not crazy or ruthless enough to walk that tightrope, let alone effect any change, especially since I don’t think any change short of the house collapsing would work.
Not a chance. The hardliners are nuts, and any attempt to deviate from the path would spell doom for our stand in Kimmy. Any show of weakness would send the sharks circling, and the threats of showing that weakness would be from all parties and directions.
No, it wouldn’t make him more popular at all. He’s ALREADY pretty popular (due to massive propaganda), despite starving folks periodically. Attempts to liberalize even a bit would be seen as weakness at this point IMHO, especially for the privileged class (oh wait…no classes in NK. From the hard working Communist Leadership I mean).
In NK’s case I think the problems are completely systemic. The food riots for the FR were only one factor of many, and I think that NK is actually much (MUCH) worse off by any metric, save that the state still manages to maintain a reign of terror that Louis wasn’t willing to perpetrate (he kept going back and forth indecisively, unlike Kimmy who knows that the only way is hammer down).
-XT
Several problems with that
If I did it though, I’d probably find a way to copy de-Stalinization and apply it to North Korea.
Nitpick: The “Great Leader” was Kim Il-Sung. Kim Jong-Il is generally known as the “Dear Leader.”
Why not just copy what the Chinese did?
The difficulty is that liberalizing the economy (which they did a bit of a few years ago) means some people will get rich. First that means you are violating the communistt principles your whole house of cards is built on; but more dangerously, it distributes huge amount of money to people outside the system with which to corrupt the system. There are always very clever businessmen who manage to become millionaires or whatever. They then bribe to get what they need. Too many of these, and the whole system falls apart.
If you have a quasi-free market in food for example, attempting to dictate changes simply causes stupid imbalances that the people see as stupid. (Egypt, for example, used to subsidize bread prices to keep the city folk quiet. Farmers found it was cheaper to buy bread than pig feed or chicken feed, thus agravating an alreay bad system.)
The NY Times had an interestig piece on people in NK complaining how the currency revaluation - issuing new currency and putting limits on how much could be traded - wiped out the life savings of many people made comfortable by the open markets. Meanwhile, people paid an employer so they were officially “state employees”, leaving them free to skip work and do free-lance entrepreneur stuff…
First off, this will not happen, of course. Not as long as the Kim family holds power (apparently Jong Il’s sons are just as bad as he). They will hold onto power as long as they can, no matter who dies as a result.
Moreover, they cannot do what you propose. There’s no way: it’s the squaring of the circle. Kim Jong Il cannot give up power and still hold it. I’d also be willing to bet that while people there have partly convinced themselves he’s great (put enough forced smiles in people’s mouths, and they’ll say anything), deep down they despise him. Some in the military may really love him, but outside of his private army and buraecracy, I don’t see it.
He definitely does not want to wind up like the Romanovs. Any attempt to loosen his economy will invite that fate in the long run. He also probnably knows that the Chinese leadership has maintained control by the skin of their teeth, and that the Chinese dictatorship cannot last forever. And keep in mnd, that’s the best case scenario for “liberalization” from his perspective.
I read the Chinese example was a reason Kim Jong Il is opposed to any reform. Reform could spiral and eventually lead to an informed, wealthy citizenry who realize they’ve been duped for the last 60 years. North Koreans aren’t going to put up with the incompetence and abuses of the Kim regime once they realize there are viable alternatives.
But the Chinese, in a much larger, more ethnically diverse country, did exactly that. There were atrocities in China equal to or greater than what goes on in NK. And yet the Communist Party is still the sole source of power in China, and any unrest has been beaten down. It’s exactly comparable, and if anything harder in China than in NK.
Being ethnically diverse makes it easier for the Chinese actually; they can put down unrest with troops that can’t even understand the local dialect and who don’t look at the locals as “their people”.
Cuts both ways. Non-Han Chinese have more reason to feel alienated and to resist in the first place.
Anyway, that isn’t central to my argument. Forget about it if you wish. There is a model to follow, and that is China. Not saying it’s easy, but it’s proven to be possible.
One tentative way to begin to “liberalize the economy” would be to simply open the border with SK . . .
Germany tried that in 1989. At a certain point, they had to speed up the merger because they east was falling apart - only huge subsidies from the west kept anything working. Imagine building a whole economy - distribution, wholesalers, retailers, buyers, dealerships for autos and farm equipment, etc. from scratch; or working with government “enterprises” where everyone pretends to work. East Germany worked because they also gave up on repression.
China lives in fear that the economic treadmill tehy are on will end. As long as people are doing well, getting richer, things are getting better - they will put up with a lot from their government. When things slow down, when times get tough, when everyone statrs to get laid off - then you see unrest. The same thing happened with the Shah of Iran - once times got tough, people statred protesting against the government, then eventually the troops refused to fire on their own people.
The new PRC People’s Army is slowly filling with people who grew up with the boom and are spoiled single children. Odds are they have not seriously tested them in these circumstances, at least since 1989 and Tien-Amen. The govrnment would prefer not to, and are scrambling to be seen to be addressing corruption and other problems that create discontent.
At least the people see that it was the government in China that helped bring about the good changes. In NK, it would be the government standing aside while rich foreigners, SK and Chinese, bring riches.
And in the end they are still heavily influenced by China and rely on foreign aid from its neighbors.
I disagree. North Korea has a lot of mineral resources (including radioactives) they also have cheap labor, they could benefit a lot through trade (and openeing themselves up would make the sanctions evaporate overnight).
Once again I disagree. If the powers that be see themselves as the primary beneficiaries of a privatization (in the way that Russia’s powerful before the fall of communism became Russia filthy rich after the fall of communism), I think it could happen, it would be a free market hellhole for a while but after a generation or two, it might be developed enough to make a unified Korea practical.
You know that there is a capitalist free trade zone in north Korea right?
Every morning 40,000 North koreans go to work in South korean factories and thoussands of South Korean managers take a train ride up to North Korea to oversee the operations. there is a similar arrangement with China.
Most South koreans think that war between the countries is unlikely despite the sinking of that naval vessel until they shut down the kaesong Industrial park.
It’s not really a free trade zone, just a special area in which South Korean companies can take advantage of dirt-cheap North Korean wages, like Mexican maquiladoras.
Bullshit. They will never throw themselves open to trade and it would not make sanctions evaporate overnight. The sanctions exist because of their behavior, and won’t go away until the behavior ends. And as other people have said and I would repeat: Throwing themselves open to free trade would be to admit that the Kims were absolutely wrong and Juche is an utter failure. Ain’t going to happen until well after the Kims are dead.
No such thing. A slave wage zone where NK pockets money for renting out their serfs. But there is no free trade there.
Why would it be admitting that the Kim’s were absolutely wrong any more than China opening itself to trade is admitting that Mao was absolutely wrong. I didn’t literally mean overnight but it would get there pretty quick once the muckity mucks realized they can make more money by exploiting the populace through capitalism than by exploiting the populace through communism.
Its a start.
By this point, the remaining strength of Kim’s regime is his absolute power. The North Korean people have been crushed into blind obedience and subjucation. The Kim regime is surviving because the people do not see any alternative.
But any reform would be like dropping a single grain of salt into a supersaturated solution. If the people were allowed to make the choice between two brands of toothpaste, it would reawaken their awareness that they can think about choices and decide between good and bad. And from there it’s a short step to deciding Kim is not the guy they want.
I have to play devil’s advocate here because I see a lot of jumping to conclusions.
North Korea is a nation wrapped around the notion of cognitive dissonance and I don’t see any reason why they cannot continue deluding themselves unto eternity if they so please.
Let’s say Kim Jong-Il comes up with some new trade deal that allows imperialist riches to flow into his country. The people start wondering where all these amazing things came from. Is Jong-Il going to tell the truth and say he debased himself before the imperialists so they would take pity on him and his oppressed masses? Of course not! He’s going to say something like “The imperials fear our might so much that they are paying tributes to us in the hopes that we don’t slay them with our proud army!” If he’s feeling really creative he could say the goods were falling from heaven, a blessing from Kim Il-Sung, who smiles upon the nation. He can claim credit for it any way he wants. What are the peasants going to say?
“Jong-Il, you’re full of shit… this stuff came from a factory across the borde-” BLAM. Would anyone else care to question the dear leader’s blessings?
I think there’s a vast gulf between toothpaste choice and government choice. You don’t take your life into your own hands when you choose Crest over Colgate or vice versa. Questioning the government in North Korea is either hard labor or your family’s extinction. They might think “Wouldn’t it be nice if we could switch leaders the same way we switch toothpaste?” Then again they might not think that at all because they know such thoughts lead to labor camps and bullets in the back of the head. I’d be surprised if the average North Korean is capable of forming a disloyal thought. Choice in government does not exist as a concept to them.
Wealth is just another thing the government can take away. Any pretense can be applied to justify it. The same punishment falls on anyone who complains about their neighbor getting bankrupted by the state. If anything, a wealthy population is better for a repressive regime because the people have more to lose and thus more reason to fear.