• The Journal of the Korea Contents Association
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.327-334
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• 2016

From the present perspective, North Korea overcame its crisis situation of the regime, the Arduous March. What was the driving force, enabling the regime to overcome the situation that could have been collapsed? This study intended to look into what strategy the North Korean government took to unite the social minds through its documentary films in the midst of the national crisis. The results of analysis are as follows. First, the documentary films emphasize that the people should become heroes in heroic fantasies. These films present the model cases, in which the people break through the hardships with their strong willpower, as an answer. Second, they mind the defeatism and encourage the triumphalism. They stress the importance of uniting collective minds as a breakthrough in overcoming the economic crisis. Third, they place an emphasis on creating the harmonized minds. They repeat the recovery of communistic morality, which has been emphasized up to date. Collective minds are eventually the outcome obtained from social experiences. North Korea stresses to convert the arduous march into the march to the paradise by the creation of collective minds through documentary films even in difficult realities.

• KDI북한경제리뷰
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.49-61
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• 2021

북한은 최근 노동당 세포비서대회에서 '고난의 행군'을 할 것을 결심하였고 이를 내부 결속을 다지는 계기로 삼자고 하였다. 북한이 올해 최고인민회의를 통하여 발표한 예산 수입 증가율은 코로나 사태를 겪었던 지난해의 0.9%로, 매우 저조한 수준으로 나타나고 있다. 본 자료에서는 북한경제의 중요한 부분인 국가 예산 수입 항목 구분의 원리를 중심으로 하여, 예산 수입 항목들의 개념과 납부 방법 등을 납세자와 납부자의 측면에서 설명함으로써 예산 수입에 대한 구체적인 이해를 돕고자 한다. 먼저 북한에서 국가 예산 납부의 의무를 갖는 단위를 설명하고, 다음으로 국가 예산 수입 항목별로 구성과 내용을 살펴본다. 자료는 북한의 관련법 및 문건, 간행물 등을 주로 참고하였음을 밝힌다.

• Korea and Global Affairs
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.85-108
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• 2017

This study speculated on a continuous issue of North Korean defectors and strategies to improve North Korean human rights. North Korean defectors have immigrated to South Korea continuously since the late 1990s. Their immigration was motivated by low financial status in the harsh marching period of North Korea until the mid-1990s. However, the defection motives changed like this: planned defection, family-based group defection and future-oriented defection. The North Korean defectors had had severe human rights abuses as illegal immigrants in the blind spots of human rights of China and the third nations until they were admitted to South Korea after defection. Although South Korea tried to help them consistently both in public and private ways, it was not satisfactory. Therefore, the government and private sectors should pay more consistent attention to the human rights issue. As the National Assembly passed the North Korean Human Rights Act on March 2016, the government should recognize the issue of North Korean defectors as that of universal value and a national issue, and cooperate each other nationally and internationally in diverse ways.

• Informatization Policy
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• v.18 no.3
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• pp.69-87
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• 2011

North Korea has been striving to promote a national informatization strategy after getting through the period of 'Arduous March'in the 1990s. First of all, North Korea has made organizations required for implementing the national informatization strategy. They reorganized and created the Science & Education Ministry, the Machine & Industry Ministry, and the 21 bureau under the Workers' Party of Korea while making special units in the Royal Mail, Royal electron & industry, National Academy of Sciences under cabinet. Then they completed all the essential organizational system for informatization including newly built specialized agencies: 'Korea Computer Center; KCC' & 'Pyongyang Informatics Center: PIC'. But North Korea's informatization system has a rigid hierarchy. All the organizations in the hierarchical system are controlled by the Workers' Party of Korea. It means that North Korea consider IT as a tool for the centralized control of the Party and the government. So, these characteristics of North Korea's informatization system clearly give us a picture that tells us what they want from the national informatization and where they're going.

• International Area Studies Review
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.71-96
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• 2017

This study analyzes the process of overcoming the impoverishment due to the failure of North Korea planned economy through marketization. Recognizing the economic policy presented by the convergence of market and planned economy system as a economy system and focusing on the 7.1 Economic Management Measures and the 6.28 New Economic Management Measures. The marketization is classified the indigenous marketization (1990-2001), the marketization focusing on central distribution (2002-2011), the marketization focusing on production (2012-2017). The major events, the economic circular structure and the economic behavior were analyzed. Results showed as following: First, through the process of marketization starting from the expansion of farmers' market and the marketization focusing on distribution, the marketization focusing on production to the marketization focusing on finance. And as the evolution of it continues, to some extent a poverty has been overcomed. Second, corporate institutions, agricultural institutions, financial institutions and progress in becoming a market economy direction. A series of privatization starting from small one to large-scale one have been progressing. Third, in order to overcome the impoverishment completely. Through foreign investment the industrialization covering a wide range of industries are urgently needed, Domestic agricultural reform, enterprise reform, price reform, financial reform, financial reform, trade and direct investment, reform, reform, distribution, etc are needed. The economic reforms across almost all sectors are needed to be combined in a global economy Expanding employment, the acquisition of foreign currencies and the acquisition of technology in the process should also be realized. The direction of change of this series of economic structures has turned Public sector and centralized into Private sector and Decentralization.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.20 no.1
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• pp.313-322
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• 2019

This study poses a question on whether the Jangmadang Generation, which has been the focus of the sociological interest, can form an actual generation by transcending the social classes, status of students, ethnicity, and gender, etc. Therefore, in this study, the author compared the consciousness of the Jangmadang Generation in terms of politics, education, society, compliance with law, and education with their preceding generations. The data used in this study were gathered from the North Korean defectors who defected within the past five years over the period from November to December 2016. A total of 200 questionnaires were used for data analysis, which was conducted using SPSS 20.0, in order to show differences between groups and perform frequency analysis. The analysis results showed that the consciousness of the Jangmadang Generation in politics, society, compliance, and education was lower, while the economic consciousness was significantly higher compared to earlier generations. As their objective generational status, the Jangmadang Generation had experienced the 'March of Ordeal' and 'Collapse of Public Education' while they were still teenagers. Such a difference in their generational status influenced the formation of different consciousness as a generation compared to the earlier generations. Compared to the earlier generations who received 'proper public education,' the Jangmadang Generation, who did not receive 'decent public education' shows a generally lower level of consciousness compared to the earlier generations. As such, the Jangmadang Generation has the potential to form a separate generation with a different generation consciousness from that of earlier generations.

• Analyses & Alternatives
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• v.8 no.1
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• pp.87-109
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• 2024

At the 8th Party Congress in 2021, North Korea announced a plan to build 50,000 housing units in Pyongyang, and this paper analyzes the economic effects and related informal costs of of the project. Currently, Pyongyang is experiencing a significant housing shortage. It is estimated that the number of households in Pyongyang increased by 184,000 between 1994 and 2020, while the estimated new housing supply during the period was only 30,000. Pyongyang's 50,000 housing units construction project is characterized by the goal of improving the living conditions of workers, the application of the new city construction method, and the largest state-led housing construction since the Arduous March. The project is expected to generate economic effects such as increasing workers' motivation to work, increasing tourism resources, and generating income from related industries. On the one hand, a significant portion of the construction cost of the 50,000-unit housing project in Pyongyang is passed on to companies and households in the form of informal cost such as quasi-taxes and manpower mobilization. In addition, there may be congestion in the power supply and sewerage facilities that occur when moving in. If these costs are not taken into account, the feasibility of a housing construction project may not be properly assessed, making it difficult to sustain it in the long term.