“North Korea, 1995-2015: An Unnoticed Demise of a Stalinist State and the Birth of a Post-Socialist Society”
Kim Koo Forum on Korea Current Affairs
FEBRUARY, 2016
Date: February 8, 2016 - 4:30pm - 6:00pm
Location: Room 105, William James Hall
Street : 33 Kirkland Street
City : Cambridge
Province : Massachusetts
Postal Code: 02138
Andrei Lankov, Professor, Kookmin University, Seoul
Chaired by Carter J. Eckert, Yoon Se Young Professor of Korean History, Harvard University
Abstract
While North Korea is still frequently described in the media as a ‘Stalinist country’, this cliche is outdated and misleading. The centrally planned economy and state-run distribution system disintegrated in the 1990s, and was replaced by a market economy. A new entrepreneurial class emerged, and now co-exists with the old party/state bureaucracy. Many feature of transitions are similar to what happened in the post-Communist Europe after 1990, but in North Korea these changes (de-industrialization etc) were not a part of government policies, but rather developed against government’s wishes. Under Kim Jong Un, though, the old elite is fusing with the new one, and control over market economy and associated institutions has been much relaxed.
Co-sponsored by the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School
The Korea Institute acknowledges the generous support of the Kim Koo Foundation.
