Witness to Transformation

by Noland, Marcus

• ISBN13: 9780881324389
• ISBN10: 0881324388
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2010-04-30
• Publisher: Peterson Inst for Intl Economics

Summary

Despite its nuclear capability, in certain respects North Korea resembles a failed state sitting uneasily atop a shifting internal foundation. This instability is due in part to the devastating famine of the 1990s, and the state¿s inability to fulfill the economic obligations that it had assumed, forcing institutions, enterprises, and households to cope with the ensuing challenges of maintaining stability with limited cooperation between the Korean government and the international community. The ineffective response to the humanitarian crisis triggered by the famine resulted in the outflow of perhaps tens of thousands of refugees, whose narratives and insight are largely overlooked in evaluating the efficacy of the humanitarian aid program. Exploiting Refugee Insights into North Korea uses extensive surveys with refugees that now reside in China or South Korea, to provide extraordinary insight into the changing pathways to power, wealth, and status within North Korea. These refugee testimonies provide an invaluable interpretation of the regime, its motivations, and its capabilities and assess the situation on the ground with the rise of inequality, corruption, and disaffection in the decade since the famine.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. xi
Acknowledgments	p. xv
Map	p. xvii
Introduction	p. 1
The Political Economy of North Korea, 1990-2010: A Brief Introduction	p. 5
Using Refugee Surveys: Sample Characteristics and Caveats	p. 15
Perils of Refugee Life	p. 19
Who Are the Refugees? A Demographic Profile	p. 20
Leaving North Korea, Coming to China	p. 27
Vulnerability	p. 32
Psychological Condition of Refugees: Prevalence of Distress	p. 36
Modeling Psychological Distress	p. 41
Moving On: Experiences in China	p. 42
Conclusion	p. 44
Marketization, Reform, and Retrenchment	p. 45
The Food Economy: Role of the Market in Household Consumption	p. 47
The Emerging Market Economy: Household Earnings	p. 58
The Political Economy of the 2002 Reforms	p. 62
Did Reform Matter? Effects on Market Behavior and Satisfaction	p. 65
The Market, Corruption, and the Changing Social Order	p. 75
Conclusion	p. 77
The Penal System and Criminalization of Economic Activity	p. 81
Criminalization of Economic Activity	p. 83
The North Korean Penal System	p. 86
Who Gets Arrested and Imprisoned?	p. 93
Nature of Punishment	p. 94
Institutionalization of Repression	p. 98
Political Attitudes and Nascent Dissent	p. 101
Political Attitudes: Perceptions of Regime Performance and Their Determinants	p. 103
Aspirations for the Future	p. 107
From Attitudes to Behavior: Political Communication	p. 109
From Attitudes to Behavior: Everyday Forms of Resistance	p. 112
Conclusion	p. 115
Conclusion	p. 119
Whither North Korea	p. 120
Engaging North Korea	p. 125
The Humanitarian and Human Rights Imperative	p. 138
Final Thoughts	p. 155
The Surveys: Implementation, Method, and Inference	p. 159
References	p. 165
About the Authors	p. 173
Index	p. 175
Tables
Educational attainment of survey respondents and North Korean population	p. 21
Occupational profile of survey respondents and (economically active) North Korean population	p. 23
Provincial distribution of survey respondents and North Korean population	p. 24
Main motive behind leaving North Korea	p. 30
Length of time in China	p. 33
Indicators of psychological distress: China survey	p. 37
Mean scores of responses on psychological state: China survey	p. 38
Reported reasons for anxiety: China survey	p. 39
Family members arrested or whereabouts unknown: China survey	p. 40
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