The Weakening of Social Control in North Korea since the Arduous March: The Case of Physical Education

ABSTRACT

This article shows how much the North Korean regime’s control over its people’s bodies has weakened as a result of the loosening of micro-power since the ‘Arduous March’ of the late 1990s. To track these types of micro-level change, the study uses Foucault’s disciplinary power and historico-critical ontology to explore the disciplinary power that has been exercised through physical education (PE) classes in North Korean schools for more than 70 years. According to Foucault, modern states have instituted networks of disciplinary power in their societies to control their people, using the political technique of the body. This type of power is directed at everyday life through social practices. By drawing on primary sources regarding PE in North Korea and on seven interviews with defectors, the article illustrates that micro-power began to develop a meticulous PE network in the school system from the 1950s and mass-produced a ‘New Communist Man’ in the 1970s and 1980s. However, the Arduous March disrupted the public distribution system, and both the network of micro-power and the institutional network of PE began to loosen. Subsequently, the New Communist Man in North Korea seems to be gradually being liberated from micro-power and is less likely to internalise obedience.

KEYWORDS:

• North Korea
• Foucauldian theory of power
• disciplinary power
• physical education (PE)
• social control
• Arduous March
• historico-critical ontology

Acknowledgements

My deepest thanks go to Professor Jungmin Seo for great support and academic guidance from early on. I am grateful to Professor Ajin Choi, Professor Woo Young Lee, Professor In-Ae Hyun, and Professor Wooyeal Paik for their insightful comments and suggestions. I am also grateful to two anonymous reviewers and the editorial board of Asian Studies Review, especially the journal editor Dr David Hundt, who helped to improve the manuscript immensely. I also would like to express my gratitude to Dr Alexander Dukalskis and Dr Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein for organising this special issue and for their helpful comments and suggestions. Lastly, I am grateful to all the interviewees who shared their memories of their school days with me. Most of them said that they enjoyed their interview because it reminded them of their forgotten school days. I am grateful for the pleasure of meeting them.

This article is based partly on the author’s PhD thesis.

Disclosure Statement

The author reports there are no competing interests to declare.

Notes

¹ Modern PE emerged from the Enlightenment in Europe and was considered military training beginning with universal military conscription. The purpose of PE was to promote individuals’ health to contribute to the strength of the state. Friedrich Ludwig Jahn of Prussia was the founder of PE, which focused on gymnastics. Gymnastics then spread from Germany to the world. Physical culture was applied in an extreme way in Fascist countries and the Soviet Union (Hoffmann, 2011, 110–124; Mosse, 1996, 43–45). From the late 19^th century, Japan was also influenced by Jahn and introduced PE, including gymnastics, to the school curriculum of Japan and its colony Chosǒn (Jung, 1999, 38–48). North Korea adopted the Soviet PE system, clearing out the remnants of Japanese imperialism. However, because the prototype of the PE system was from modern Western Europe, North Korea’s PE system was not entirely different from the Japanese one.

² Foucault’s (2003a, 254–255) concept of modern racism means biological distinction within a population.

³ In 2009, North Korea replaced the term ‘New Communist Man’ in its constitution with ‘New Juche Man’, and in 2019 ‘New Juche Man’ was further replaced by ‘Socialist Construction Corps’.

⁴ Students participate in mandatory production-activity as part of the school curriculum (Kyowŏn, 1960).

⁵ Kyowǒn Sinmun was renamed Kyoyuk Sinmun in March 2004.

⁶ South Korea’s Information Center on the DPRK holds copies of the magazine from 2004.

⁷ The author has tried to meet the ethical standards required by Yonsei University at all times, such as by seeking consent at the time of the interviews, even though this was not strictly required. However the study was not subjected to formal IRB review, although in more recent times this has become a requirement.

⁸ Children are required to participate in the Sonyǒndan from ages of 7 to 13.

⁹ Persons aged 14 to 30 after the Sonyǒndan are required to join the Ch’ŏngnyŏndongmaeng (Kyowǒn, 1956a).

¹⁰ Foucault (2003b; 2007a) argued that the setting of Western modernity was influenced by Judeo-Christian culture, one of the two pillars of Western culture. With the Reformation, the Bible was translated from Latin into other languages, and more and more people read it. This affected the emergence of the Enlightenment, and the ideological and philosophical framework was crafted wherein a New Man, an individual possessed of dignity, freedom, and rights, might emerge. This resulted in the emergence of civil society, the establishment of institutions, and the birth of the modern state. It can be inferred that Foucault was critical of the setting although his writing has been described as value neutral. In the years before his death, Foucault (2003c) was studying self-care in the Greco-Roman era.