In this article, we trace the strategy of political control employed in North Korea under Kim Jong Un. Using conceptual tools created in the literature on comparative authoritarianism, we consider the roles of repression, co-optation, coercive distribution, and containment with respect to how the North Korean regime responds to external and internal threats. We focus on two areas as case studies in differentiated, contingent political control strategies. First, we consider the role of border as a conduit for unauthorized goods, migrants, and illicit information and the regime’s regulation of it. Second, we examine the regime’s management of internal economic actors, namely urban entrepreneurs and farmers. The main argument of this article is that Kim Jong Un has employed a policy of simultaneous co-optation, repression, and latterly under COVID-19, reemergent coercive distribution, building on but also modifying the strategic approaches pursued under Kim Jong Il.
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July/August 2023
Research Article|
April 24 2023
Strategies of Political Control under Kim Jong Un: Understanding the Changing Mix of Containment, Repression, Co-optation, and Coercive Distribution
Peter Ward,
Peter Ward is a Senior Researcher at Kookmin University, Seoul, South Korea.
Email: <[email protected]>.
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Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein
Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Edmond J. Safra for Ethics at Tel Aviv University and an Associate Fellow at the Swedish Institute for International Affairs.
Email: <[email protected]>.
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Email: <[email protected]>.
Email: <[email protected]>.
Asian Survey (2023) 63 (4): 557–583.
Citation
Peter Ward, Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein; Strategies of Political Control under Kim Jong Un: Understanding the Changing Mix of Containment, Repression, Co-optation, and Coercive Distribution. Asian Survey 1 August 2023; 63 (4): 557–583. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/as.2023.1826437
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