Will North Korea Embrace Democracy? Research Paper Example

North Korea is known as a society ruled under a communistic party with the population of the people having no power and very little, if any, knowledge of the existing outside world.  In addition, Korea operates with disregard to United Nations rules.  For instance, there was an emergency meeting in February 2013 when North Korea conducted a nuclear test against the United Nation orders.  One month after the test, North Korea threatened to launch a nuclear attack directly on the United States.  However, there have been some strides met in regard to the start of capitalism in North Korea.  Therefore, does an economic system based on capitalism lead to democratization?  Will the economic change have an impact on this non-democratic country?

There have been efforts made for democracy set forth by South Korean activists and politicians who are trying to change North Korean views.  Activists have tried to send messages to North Korea since it is impossible to know if North Koreans are aware about the pro-democracy that is occurring in other nations across the globe, such as the Middle East and North Africa.  South Korean activists have been trying to educate the people about dictators and revolutions through the use of propaganda such as balloons and leaflets; however, the use of propaganda has prompted threats from the North Korean government for those who participate.  It is more likely that North Korea will gradually change to a democratic system based on capitalism.

North Korea is faced with food and power scarcities and in order to help alleviate this problem, a new policy was set forth in 2013 for North Korean famers, factories and other business to provide adjustments to salaries, such as raises to any worker who helps increase production.  It can be argued that providing such incentives to the people in North Korea offers some control in the economic decision making department.  John Delury, an assistant professor in Chinese Studies at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea stated that the economic incentives and loss of some control in economics are two key elements in transforming a command economy to a market-based system.¹

Although North Korea has started to enforce policies that show capitalism, empirical observation has found that capitalism is not a necessary factor for the success of a democracy; however, evidence shows that there have been other non-democratic countries that started capitalist economics in order to decrease poverty; however, the countries could not be called a democracy, such as Chile.  In addition, other nations, such as India and China have turned to capitalism to decrease poverty, but they did not turn into a democratic country.  On the other hand, several other countries such as the Philippines, Singapore, and Spain became a capitalistic country before becoming democratic.  Capitalisms is not a factor for success of democracy; however, in order to maintain capitalism, democracy is necessary.²

The question persists as whether or not North Korea will embrace democracy?  The non-democratic countries such as India and China have turned to capitalism in times of extreme poverty only, not for policy changes.  It seems that North Korea has the same idea and will manipulate the capitalistic system for needs only to pull out of extreme poverty and then return to a command economy.

Notes

The World Post. North Korea Capitalism? Farmers Planting Rice With Bonuses In Mind.  (2013). http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/31/north-korea-capitalism-farmers-planting-bonuses_n_3365754.html

Novack, M.  Democratic Capitalism.  (2013). http://www.nationalreview.com/article/359306/democratic-capitalism-michael-novak.