True Believers: Conversations with North Koreans

Abstract

IntroductionFirst-time visitors to South Korea, especially if they arrive at night, cannot miss the sea of red and white neon crosses perched atop the multi- story commercial buildings that populate the urban landscape. A cross on such a building means that somewhere inside, likely smashed between an English language academy and an Internet cafe is a small but dynamic Christian church. Korean Christianity is notable for its lack of nominal Christians. South Korean Christians are believers, going to church several times a week, arriving in the pre- dawn hours for morning prayer (saebyeokgido), and attending home Bible studies. On the surface, the dynamism of Christianity (and other religions) appears to be just another point of contrast between South Koreans and their northern kin, but perhaps of a different sort in North Korea are more numerous than one might expect, or hope.After a recent trip to North Korea, I concluded that the few elite North Koreans I was exposed to were indeed, believers.1 They are true believers in a system that to outsiders appears so brittle it could crumble at any moment, but to them best explains the world around them. Like people everywhere, North Koreans are trying to make sense of their environment, but they are denied the information necessary to arrive at independent conclusions or to challenge the narrative of the ruling regime. Being aware of the faith of these is essential to understand the nature of the bonds that hold North Korea together; to explain how they have successfully executed two successions that many experts predicted would topple the regime, and to appreciate the reason why there is no obvious solution to the problems that stem from the division of the Korean peninsula.Traveling to North Korea was a difficult decision. Apart from the cost, it raised some moral questions. The hard currency brought in by the small tourism industry is a source of direct support for the Kim regime. I did not want to travel there unless I could learn something valuable. I needed a plan and gradually devised one; instead of going to North Korea with the idea of attempting to break away from my minders to see the real North Korea, I would make my minders the subject of my research. Rather than trying to find the hidden North Korea, I would focus on the visible North Korea, and the North Koreans the regime wanted me to see.Kim Il- sung Mausoleum: A Fitting IntroductionTo understand the faith of North Koreans, it is first necessary to understand the cult of the Kims. Among the personality cults of the 20th century, the Kims' stands out for its longevity and virility. There has never been a Korean parallel to de-Stalinization, or even a modest reevaluation that Kim Il- sung was 70 percent right and 30 percent wrong, as Deng Xiaoping famously said of Mao Zedong. Although Kim Il- sung ruled North Korea since the 1940s his personality cult was not founded until the early 1970s, just as the North Korean economy was beginning to slip into terminal decline.2 The personality cult was a way to cultivate loyalty and concentrate power at the very top while North Korea was transitioning from a singleparty Communist state to a personal dictatorship. From its inception it appears Kim Il- sung's son, Kim Jong- il, managed and developed the cult with an eye toward making it the cornerstone of the Kim family's dynastic rule.3 Since his death in 1994 Kim Il- sung has remained the eternal president. My minders never once mentioned the death of Kim Il- sung, only his demise.The essence of the Kim cult is best understood by a visit to Kim Il- sung's mausoleum on the outskirts of Pyongyang. Located at the end of a kilometer- long boulevard visitors are struck by its sheer size. In front of the mausoleum is a square just a bit smaller than Tiananmen in Beijing, but the complex itself dwarfs the mausoleums of Mao and Stalin. We were unloaded at a special pavilion across a moat from the mausoleum. …