ASIA
26 March 2014
Even North Korea is changing
More and more North Koreans now have access to information from the outside world that starkly contrasts with official propaganda. Could this undermine the control of this authoritarian state?
For more than a half a century, the North Korean government has used an information blockade and other measures to instil a sense of fear and distrust of the outside world. This strategy of fear, isolation, and unquestioning subservience has contributed to the regime's ability to remain in power against all odds.
But North Koreans have been taking matters into their own hands since a 1990s famine prompted an opening of their country's long border with China, and official tolerance of markets where food and goods are traded, according to a report by the InterMedia consultancy.
The study, "A Quiet Opening: North Koreans in a Changing Media Environment", reveals that substantial numbers of North Koreans are able to access various forms of foreign media. These include foreign TV and radio broadcasts, and particularly foreign DVDs brought into the country from China by cross-border traders and smugglers. State officials and rich people run these operations.
Other sources of outside information, particularly for elites, include smuggled mobile phones capable of receiving foreign signals, and otherwise legal MP3/MP4 players and USB drives which contain ilicit foreign content. The proliferation of illegal Chinese mobile phones along the Sino-North Korean border has also greatly increased the efficiency of cross-border trading, remittances and defection.
DVDs have quickly grown to become the most commonly accessed form of outside media in North Korea. North Koreans gather together to watch illegal DVDs. Avid consumption of South Korean movies and pop music as well as foreign radio and television broadcasts are changing North Korean views of its southern neighbor and even of the United States.
Since the mid-2000s, there has been an expansion of radio broadcasters into North Korea. In adition to official government-funded stations such as Voice of America, Radio Free Asia and Korean Broadcasting System, independent broadcasters, some funded by the US government, like Open Radio for North Korea, Radio Free Chosun, North Korea Reform Radio and Free North Korea Radio, also broadcast into North Korea.
North Koreans are now less fearful of sharing that information than ever before, creating an information multiplier effect. This strengthens bonds between North Korean citizens, breaking the state’s top-down monopoly on the supply of information and ideas.
While severe and often arbitrary punishments are still handed down for accessing outside media, North Koreans are now generally less afraid of being caught. Enforcement is irregular, bribes often allow one to avoid punishment and far fewer North Koreans appear to be reporting on each other than before.
New leader Kim Jong-un has shown no sign of relaxing controls that keep nearly all 23 million North Koreans unconnected to the Internet and mandate that radios and televisions are preset to receive only government channels. And global watchdogs like Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders routinely rank North Korea as the country with the least free media in the world.
But the North Korean government is losing its total monopoly over information, and North Korean people's understanding of the world is changing. These same factors played a critical role in bringing the Cold War to an end in Europe.
The report advises against predicting political action from better-informed North Koreans -- "North Koreans' ability to express such views in North Korea is extremely limited and their ability to act on them is almost nonexistent." Moreover, North Korea's official ideology -- a personality cult which proceeds from myths about the race and its history -- still has a very strong sway over the country's masses.
But the opening up to external information now seems an unstoppable trend over the longer term. Outsiders, like the US and South Korean governments and civil society, will no doubt continue to play an important role in promoting greater access to information for North Korean citizens. And corruption inside North Korea itself will facilitate the process, and undermine the government's stranglehold on the society.
Kim Jong-un could take inspiration from the experience of Burma. Rather than continuing to repress his citizens, he should pre-emptively rewrite his social contract with them by opening up and gradually moving towards democracy. As the case of Burma shows, there are many rewards that can be had by the elite -- foreign aid, independence from China, a US presidential visit -- and possibly a greater chance of longer term survival. Asia is full of semi-democratic, one party-dominated states.
North Korea may yet join us in the Asian Century. Hope springs eternal!
Executive Director
Asian Century Institute
www.asiancenturyinstitute.com
But North Koreans have been taking matters into their own hands since a 1990s famine prompted an opening of their country's long border with China, and official tolerance of markets where food and goods are traded, according to a report by the InterMedia consultancy.
The study, "A Quiet Opening: North Koreans in a Changing Media Environment", reveals that substantial numbers of North Koreans are able to access various forms of foreign media. These include foreign TV and radio broadcasts, and particularly foreign DVDs brought into the country from China by cross-border traders and smugglers. State officials and rich people run these operations.
Other sources of outside information, particularly for elites, include smuggled mobile phones capable of receiving foreign signals, and otherwise legal MP3/MP4 players and USB drives which contain ilicit foreign content. The proliferation of illegal Chinese mobile phones along the Sino-North Korean border has also greatly increased the efficiency of cross-border trading, remittances and defection.
DVDs have quickly grown to become the most commonly accessed form of outside media in North Korea. North Koreans gather together to watch illegal DVDs. Avid consumption of South Korean movies and pop music as well as foreign radio and television broadcasts are changing North Korean views of its southern neighbor and even of the United States.
Since the mid-2000s, there has been an expansion of radio broadcasters into North Korea. In adition to official government-funded stations such as Voice of America, Radio Free Asia and Korean Broadcasting System, independent broadcasters, some funded by the US government, like Open Radio for North Korea, Radio Free Chosun, North Korea Reform Radio and Free North Korea Radio, also broadcast into North Korea.
North Koreans are now less fearful of sharing that information than ever before, creating an information multiplier effect. This strengthens bonds between North Korean citizens, breaking the state’s top-down monopoly on the supply of information and ideas.
While severe and often arbitrary punishments are still handed down for accessing outside media, North Koreans are now generally less afraid of being caught. Enforcement is irregular, bribes often allow one to avoid punishment and far fewer North Koreans appear to be reporting on each other than before.
New leader Kim Jong-un has shown no sign of relaxing controls that keep nearly all 23 million North Koreans unconnected to the Internet and mandate that radios and televisions are preset to receive only government channels. And global watchdogs like Freedom House and Reporters Without Borders routinely rank North Korea as the country with the least free media in the world.
But the North Korean government is losing its total monopoly over information, and North Korean people's understanding of the world is changing. These same factors played a critical role in bringing the Cold War to an end in Europe.
The report advises against predicting political action from better-informed North Koreans -- "North Koreans' ability to express such views in North Korea is extremely limited and their ability to act on them is almost nonexistent." Moreover, North Korea's official ideology -- a personality cult which proceeds from myths about the race and its history -- still has a very strong sway over the country's masses.
But the opening up to external information now seems an unstoppable trend over the longer term. Outsiders, like the US and South Korean governments and civil society, will no doubt continue to play an important role in promoting greater access to information for North Korean citizens. And corruption inside North Korea itself will facilitate the process, and undermine the government's stranglehold on the society.
Kim Jong-un could take inspiration from the experience of Burma. Rather than continuing to repress his citizens, he should pre-emptively rewrite his social contract with them by opening up and gradually moving towards democracy. As the case of Burma shows, there are many rewards that can be had by the elite -- foreign aid, independence from China, a US presidential visit -- and possibly a greater chance of longer term survival. Asia is full of semi-democratic, one party-dominated states.
North Korea may yet join us in the Asian Century. Hope springs eternal!
Author
John WestExecutive Director
Asian Century Institute
www.asiancenturyinstitute.com