Earlier this week, PBS FRONTLINE broadcast a new video documentary titled Secret State of North Korea that contained rare video footage of developments and daily life inside the DPRK. As part of the project, PBS interviewed CSIS Korea Chair Victor Cha, who appears in the video.
Dr. Cha also appeared on Christiane Amanpour’s CNN program to discuss the PBS documentary:
The program contains unique images of dissent in North Korea by everyday people and looks at the prospects for young North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un to retain control. PBS also posted the transcript of an extended interview with Dr. Cha, which cogitASIA has excerpted.
PBS FRONTLINE: How do you think that Kim Jong-un proposes that kind of economic development given that he doesn’t seem to want to reform?
Dr. Cha: Kim Jong-un faces what is the dictator’s dilemma, which is that they need to open up to survive, but the process of opening up could lead to the collapse of the regime — not the state, but of the regime. So this is a dilemma that he faces. It’s one his father faced; it’s one his grandfather faced.
So when North Korea talks about economic development, what they are largely talking about are projects that they can keep closed off from the majority of the population and that can provide immediate cash, hard currency, for the regime.
This idea of trying to start something that will then eventually bleed into the rest of society and create change, that is not the sort of opening North Korea wants. They want tourism projects that can be fenced off where people go; they pay money, and they leave. That’s the sort of project that they’re interested in.
The Kaesong Industrial Complex, the Diamond Mountain project, some of these economic zones that they’re doing on their border now in China, in a sense that’s what these are. They’re small islands of economic activity that become a vehicle for funneling hard currency to the regime but minimize the impact on the North Korean population more generally.
To read the full interview click here. To watch the Secret State of North Korea, click here.
Victor Cha
Dr. Victor Cha is senior adviser and Korea Chair at CSIS. He is also a professor of government at Georgetown University.
I want to know what Dr. Cha thinks of the visit of the Big Three to Incheon! What does it foretell?