{"id":2889,"date":"2016-12-29T11:36:18","date_gmt":"2016-12-29T02:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.01.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang-2\/2016\/12\/report\/20161229-market-economy-realty-08\/"},"modified":"2018-08-24T18:20:48","modified_gmt":"2018-08-24T09:20:48","slug":"20161229-market-economy-realty-08","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/2016\/12\/society-economy\/20161229-market-economy-realty-08\/","title":{"rendered":"\uff1cInside N.Korea\uff1e Expansion of the market economy as the driving force behind social transformation--based on sources from inside N.Korea. (PART8, FINAL) The \u201cclass system\u201d is being shaken. by ISHIMARU Jiro"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Food stalls at Moran market in central Pyongyang. The women are not the shop clerks but they are the owners of the stalls, which are 80 cm in width. 2011 July. Taken by Koo Gwang-ho (ASIAPRESS)<\/p><\/div>\n

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2016\/Dec\/29<\/em><\/p>\n

6 Expansion of the market economy shaking the \u201cclass system\u201d
\n <\/strong><\/h2>\n

Hwang Jang-yop, the former secretary of the Workers' Party of Korea, defected to South Korea with a script of Kim Jong-il\u2019s speech given in December 1996 at Kim Il-sung University. In the speech, he mentioned the \u201cfarmer\u2019s market\u201d and that, \u201cthe growth of the \u2018farmer\u2019s market\u2019 and merchants may fuel an egoism in people\u2019s minds, causing an instability of the class system.\u201d\u00a0 Eventually, the Party may lose its foundational support from the general public.\u00a0 It is a similar situation to what happened in Czechoslovakia and Poland.\u00a0 [Note: A South Korean magazine. \u201cThe monthly Korean affairs\u201d 1997.04]\n

For two reasons, Kim Jong-il regarded the expansion of a farmer\u2019s market, becoming very much a black market, as the birth of capitalism: a significant threat to the regime.\u00a0 First, as for the much touted \u201csocialism supremacy,\u201d the incapability to provide people with clothes, food, shelter, education, and medical care casts doubt by the people on socialism in North Korea. \u00a0Second, the collapse of the \u201cgovernance based on the food supply\u201d may also fuel an anti-socialist sentiment among the masses.<\/p>\n

Around 20 years has passed since Kim Jong-il made that speech.\u00a0 The expansion of the market economy, initially born as a black market, has slowly but steadily evolved into a nationwide commerce system.\u00a0 In spite of repeated interference and the many compromises of the government, the market economy has become prevalent without even being led by the regime or having any drastic legal challenges.
\n Related Article:\u00a0\uff1cInside N. Korea\uff1e Expansion of the market economy as the driving force behind social transformation\u2013based on sources from inside North Korea. (PART1)<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

However, the North Korean government has not given up on socialism and nor the planned economy.\u00a0 The Supreme People's Assembly held every April, which reports the result of the previous year\u2019s national budget and plans, and discusses then approves the national budget for the next year.\u00a0 However, since 2002, the amount of the annual industrial production, grain production, and the national budget have not been released: strangely, only the annual percentage of change as compared to the previous year has been published.\u00a0 Since the planned economy has been dysfunctional, the currency, the North Korean Won, can no longer show on an economic indicator. [*Note 4]\n Next page: The Kim Jong-un regime partly introduced the market economy...<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u25c6<\/strong> The Kim Jong-un regime partly introduces the market economy
\n <\/strong><\/p>\n

What is Kim Jong-un\u2019s standing towards the market economy?\u00a0 The Kim Jong-un regime, established after the sudden death of Kim Jong-il at the end of 2011, introduced the \u201cnew economic management system in the North Korean style socialism\u201d and has encouraged companies to implement financially self supportive systems. \u00a0Furthermore, corporations got further autonomy to invent, produce, and sell new products aside from their state-assigned quotas and also a greater freedom of trade and joint ventures with other companies.\u00a0 Also in the agricultural industry, the \"June 28th Measures\" allowed North Korean farmers to spare larger amounts of productions for themselves. [*Note 5]\n

However, the Kim Jong-un regime has persistently insisted that the market activity only takes a supplemental role in the space of the socialist economy.
\n Related Article:\u00a0\uff1cInside N. Korea\uff1e Market survey shows \u201cResolution 2270\u201d, the toughest-ever sanctions, didn\u2019t work<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Choson Shinbo Online reported that, \u201cIt is argued that the decentralization of economic management strengthens the \u2018co-existence of the planned economy and the market economy,\u2019 which ends up with a turn to the \u201cprivatization of the means of production.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 However, a government official in charge of the financial administration denies that and has said that, \u201cNorth Korea has surely maintained its control over the means of production, which is based on socialism.\u201d [*Note 6]\n

It is interesting that the official newspaper of the General Association of Korean Residents in Japan, Choson Shinbo Online, has repeatedly reported that, \u201cthe new economic reforms are not an \"open door\" policy at all.\"<\/p>\n

As mentioned, the expansion and the spread of the market economy has considerably transformed the North Korean society and allowed for a social mobility that had never existed before.\u00a0 The flow of people, goods, money, and information has been hugely active, making state-owned properties a commodity in themselves and even a nascent labor market has emerge.
\n Next page:\u00a0 The North Korea style \u201cclass system and caste system\u201d being weakened...<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u25c6<\/strong> The North Korean style \u201cclass system and caste system\u201d is being weakened
\n <\/strong><\/p>\n

Aside from a social transformation, the North Korean style of a \u201cclass system and caste system\u201d, which is based on traditional socialism has crippled.\u00a0 Nowadays, if one has money, one can become a member of the Party and become a government official.\u00a0 Farmers at collective farms, mostly unable to move to urban areas in the past, can quit their job and stay in a city as long as they have money.\u00a0 On the contrary, once-privileged \u201canti-Japanese revolutionary families\u201d and \u201cfamilies of a soldier who fought in the Korean War,\u201d who have obediently supported the regime, have lost most of their practical privileges.\u00a0 Thus, those who do not have money cannot be successful in North Korea.\u00a0 The marketization gave birth to a wider gap of economic inequality, changing the structure of what social status is in North Korea.
\n Related Article:\u00a0[Video Report] National bus network of the North Korean market economy<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

The prevailing market economy has also made changes in the way people think.\u00a0 Since it has been common to make a living without depending on the regime, the Party, or the leader, the loyalty towards the government and the leader have been considerably weakened and a sense of apathy has become more and more prominent.\u00a0 Everyone is busy with their own businesses.<\/p>\n

As mentioned above, information from outside has stimulated a social transformation.\u00a0 There is a wide-known understanding among the masses that other socialist states such as China and Vietnam have drastically prospered due to an \"open door\" policy and that South Korea, taught to be regarded as a hostile country, has become a very well off and economically developed country.\u00a0 As a consequence, the number of people who can reckon their poverty and the lack of freedom in comparison has sharply increased. I have come to a conclusion after interviewing a number of North Koreans that the general public in North Korea thinks that the North Korean political establishment should, firmly adhering to socialism, pursue with an \"open door policy.
\n Related Article:\u00a0N.Korea Market Survey Reveals Basic Food Price Hike<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

However, it is important to closely and carefully monitor the situation inside North Korea in order to understand what kind of effect, and to what degree, the expansion of the market economy has on the Kim Jong-un regime.\u00a0 An ever-enlarging market economy may cripple the control of the regime, but the government may successfully be able to take advantage of the market economy for economic development and use that to stabilize the regime.<\/p>\n

[End]<\/strong><\/p>\n

[Honorific titles are omitted]<\/strong><\/p>\n[Note 4]: Eiji Yamamoto, \u201cThe current situation and the future prospect of the North Korean economy\u2013 the direction of the reform and the opening-up policy\u201c, New ESRI Working Paper Series No.7, August 2008.<\/p>\n[Note 5], [Note 6]: Kim Ji-young \u201cMore autonomy was given to producers.\u00a0 The North Korean style socialistic economic management.\u201d, Choson Shinbo Online, on the 4th<\/sup> February 2014. http:\/\/chosonsinbo.com\/jp\/2014\/02\/20140204riyo\/<\/p>\n[Note]: This report is the revision of my article \u201cThe expansion of the market economy and the social transformation in North Korea\u2013based on the sources from inside North Korea\u201d.\u00a0 It was posted on \u201cThe economy and the politics in South Korea and North Korea\u201d, in \u201cKenkyu-sousho Vol. 162\u201d published by Institute of Economic and Political Studies, Kansai University, on March 2016.<\/p>\n

\uff1cMarket Economy in N.Korea\uff1e View article sections<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u3010Related Article<\/strong>\u3011
\n \u25c6 Is Economic Sanction Really Effective? Searching Effect from Retail Price Index<\/a><\/span>
\n \u25c6 Delinquent Juveniles Mobilized For Forced Labor<\/a><\/span>
\n \u25c6 [Video Report] Back alley of Pyongyang: Never let foreigners go. Residents of central Pyongyang live on businesses in the market<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"rimjingang_banner001\"*\u00a0<\/span><\/a>Editor\u2019s notes on North Korean reporters<\/a>
\n <\/a>ALL REPORTS >>><\/a> <\/strong><\/span>
\n ARCHIVE(pdf) >><\/a><\/span>
\n DPRK MAP >><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

  2016\/Dec\/29 6 Expansion of the market economy shaking the \u201cclass system\u201d Hwang Jang-yop, the former secretary of \u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3563,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0},"categories":[12,13],"tags":[20],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2889"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3563"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.02.asiapress.org\/rimjin-gang\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}