B.R. Myers: North Korea’s Juche Myth I

I have never put much weight on ideological explanations of North Korea’s domestic or foreign behavior. To be sure, the regime was communist at birth, thanks to the Soviet occupation. The regime’s communism influenced economic policy and structure and political institutions in predictable ways. As in other communist takeovers, private property was nationalized, agriculture collectivized and markets curtailed under the thumb of the plan; this is no small ideological effect. North Korea’s formal p

Source: Peterson Institute (PIIE)