North Korea's highly-regimented and densely stratified society is underpinned by its home-grown ideology of Juche (also sometimes written as Juché and chuch'e) which promotes self-reliance in matters concerning foreign policy and economy.
Juche was first evoked by Kim il-Sung in 1955, when he spoke of the need for North Korea to use its unique national identity as a way of differentiating itself from Socialist allies such as the Soviet Union or China. At this time Juche was not yet a fully-formed ideology and no mention was made of self-reliance, but the bare bones of this bastardisation of Marxism-Leninism and Confucianism were gradually fleshed out over the next ten years.
The Origins of Juche
According to North Korea's official history, the Great Leader Kim il-Sung first expounded the philosophy of Juche in 1930 when he was in exile in Manchuria and leading guerilla attacks against the Japanese, even though the text of this speech was not made public until the mid-1960's when Juche was beginning to dominate North Korean propaganda.
As with most of North Korea's state-approved history - including the fact that the Dear Leader Kim Jong-il was born atop the sacred Mount Paektu , an occasion reportedly marked by a rare double rainbow and the shining of a bright star - it should of course be taken with a pinch of salt.
In fact, although Kim il-Sung first evoked the term Juche (which in Korean literally translates as "main body" or "subject") in 1955 when talking of the need to promote a political system based on Korean nationalism above imported Socialist models, it didn't come to mean self-reliance or independence until 1965 at the earliest.
Juche Becomes the Core Ideology of North Korea
In 1970, during the Fifth Congress of the Korean Workers Party (KWP), Juche was officially confirmed as one of the core tenets of the North Korean state, alongside the existing ideology of Marxism-Leninism. By this time Juche had evolved into an ideology which called for the promotion of a specific Korean nationalism above all others, as well as independence in foreign policy and a self-sufficient economy.
In 1980, North Korea, by now deviating drastically from the accepted values of the Communist bloc, broke definitively from the Socialist fold by removing all mention of Marxism-Leninism from its constitution. This change only served to create the illusion of ideological independence, however, because North Korea still remained a perfect example of a Stalinist state.
The Relevance of Juche in 2010
The advantage of Juche above Marxism-Leninism is that it is an infinitely flexible ideology which the North Korean leadership can endlessly adjust to best suit the current situation and it matters little that the notion of North Korea being in any way self-reliant has long since been discredited.
The country suffered years of famine during the mid-1990's which claimed as many as two or three million lives - estimates vary wildly owing to the secretive nature of the regime - and is currently in the grip of yet another debilitating food shortage. Pyongyang remains dependent on foreign aid, which comes from NGO's such as the World Food Program (WFP) to make up its annual harvest shortfall and feed its starving population.
The only area in which North Korea can claim to be independent is defence. Kim Jong-il, perhaps as a way of shoring up his position and avoiding any possibility of a coup promoted an army first policy in the late 1990's - known as Songun - which means that the majority of available funds and provisions are channelled towards the army. This includes both the development of missile and nuclear technology and the feeding of soldiers.
It is fair to say that Juche, which has always been an empty ideological shell, is only relevant today in North Korea in matters that concern the military and a case could be made that Songun has in fact replaced Juche as the pre-eminent ideology in the country.
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