Once in a lifetime

THE last time North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party, the KWP, held a national congress was in October 1980, when its present leader, Kim Jong Un, was not even born. The meeting’s main purpose was to formalise the party’s graduation from a traditional Marxist-Leninist dictatorship to a dynastic one. Mr Kim’s father, Kim Jong Il, was crowned as dauphin to his own father, Kim Il Sung, the country’s founding leader. The eldest Kim died in 1994 but, even in death, remains the country’s “eternal president”. Meanwhile party doctrine largely ditched Marx, Lenin and the rest in favour of Kim Il Sung’s own ideology of juche, or self-reliance (real meaning: distrust, confront and rob foreigners). Kim Jong Il ruled until his death in December 2011 without feeling the need ever to convene a party congress. Yet his son is preparing to preside over one, starting on May 6th. In the world’s most closed political system, it is not easy to work out why.  

Precedent is no explanation. In 1980 five-yearly congresses were decreed. But a 35-year gap has opened since. The calendar imposes no more pressure on Kim Jong Un than...Continue reading

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