How Has the Kim Family Held on to Power So Long?
The following content is adapted from North Korea 101, LiNK’s FREE online course that explains what's happening in North Korea beyond the headlines. Start learning today.
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“This question is fundamental. To understand where we are and where we might be heading, we have to understand where we’ve come from.” – Sokeel Park, LiNK CSO
The North Korean regime is the world’s worst dictatorship, an extreme remnant of 20th century authoritarianism that has stretched across eight decades and three generations of the ruling Kim family. The regime’s all-encompassing system of control constrains the North Korean people’s agency and potential, resulting in an enforced poverty which includes physiological, material, social, informational, and cultural deprivations.
It is not easy for dictators to maintain power for long. During the Kim family’s rule, the world has seen the rise and fall of dozens of other dictatorships. Through many periods of global change and internal instability, they’ve managed to maintain power not by sheer force or luck, but through an array of adaptive strategies. But when the media portrays Kim Jong Un as crazy or irrational, it undermines our understanding and approaches to try to undermine that dictatorship.
There is a formula to their approach, and if we can understand it, then we can counteract it.
The Four Ways Dictators Lose Power
Historically, the fall of dictators can be attributed to four factors. By looking at each of them, we can see how the ruling Kim family has strategically avoided these fates.
1. Military Defeat/International Intervention
An external country or force intervening and overthrowing a dictator through military defeat.
2. Elite Challenges
An internal challenge emerging from within the country’s top political or military circles, forcibly removing the current dictator by assasination or a coup d'état,
3. Popular Uprising
An internal challenge from below, where a mass movement forces a change in leadership. In some cases, parts of the elite may join the side of the masses.
4. Death in Office
The death of the current leader, opening up an opportunity for someone else to assume control and end the dictatorship or make significant changes.
Threat #1: Preventing Military Overthrow
To prevent an external power from overthrowing their dictatorship, the Kim family first needs a strong deterrent against military force. The vast majority of mainstream news coverage of North Korea focuses on one thing: nuclear weapons. Having nuclear weapons and being seen as potentially willing and able to use them is arguably the most effective way to deter a military intervention from the outside.
Second, the Kim family has strategically managed their relations with countries like the Soviet Union / Russia, China, the United States, and South Korea. They go back and forth between periods of warmer and colder relations, effectively balancing opportunities and risks to gain support while preventing too much external influence. It’s unlikely that the Kim family has ever really trusted any of these external powers, even those that are sometimes labelled as “allies”.
Threat #2: Preventing Elite Challenges
Historically, the position of dictator can be very tempting to others within the leadership’s orbit, from competing family members to senior politicians or military leaders. To prevent anyone from building too much power and becoming a threat, the ruling Kim family carefully manages elite politics, alternating between demoting, promoting, and purging top officials.
On top of that, cross-layered surveillance between different institutions also keeps potential challengers under surveillance and in check, and prevents any one person or group of people from launching a challenge for power.
Threat #3: Preventing Popular Uprisings
The next scenario that the regime must prevent is a popular uprising.
A common conception of North Korea is that if the people wanted to rise up and revolt, they would have, and so they must be brainwashed or bought into the regime’s ideologies. While the latter may be true to some degree, it's difficult to fully grasp the extent to which the government’s system of control deprives people of their agency and potential and prevents them from challenging dictatorial rule.
North Korea is the most closed country in the world. The regime has forcibly cut off North Koreans from the rest of humanity, which serves as the baseline for their control. This centers everything—social structure, daily life, resources, information—around the regime, and eliminates sources that could undermine or threaten their authoritarian rule.
Laying the Foundation: Kim Il Sung’s Half-Century in Power
Kim Il Sung was 33 years old when he was installed into power by the Soviet Union—very young in global politics at the time, when most leaders were in their 50s and 60s. This historical happenstance has ended up being a key factor in the longevity of the Kim family’s control.
From his rise to power in 1945 to his death in 1994 at the age of 82, Kim Il Sung had 49 years to mold North Korea’s politics and systems in his image. During this time, he laid the foundation for hereditary succession by:
- Centralizing power around this dictatorship.
- Building a cult of personality around himself and his direct lineage: propaganda and myth-making that legitimized the Kim family as the only North Koreans worthy to lead the country.
- Purging anyone who could have been an alternative leader.
When it came time for Kim Jong Il to assume power, and the Kim Jong Un after that, decades of preparation smoothened the transition.
Now, after three generations of the Kim family, it would be very difficult for anyone else, even among the upper elite, to try and take power. Even if someone did manage to depose the current dictator, they would have to contend with not just managing the power vacuum, but the ideological void left by decades of propaganda and mythmaking that surrounded the Kim family.
Without the legitimacy that had been set up by the Kims, a new leader would likely find it difficult to maintain power for long. This is something that North Korean elites understand, which further discourages any rival officials from challenging the current regime.
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How A North Korean Defector Sends Money Back Home
It may seem like North and South Korea are completely cut off from each other, but even after decades of separation, channels of communication persist. Defectors who have made it to freedom are bridging the gap, connecting people inside North Korea to the world beyond. Through extensive broker networks, they send back money and information, accelerating change in the world’s most authoritarian country.
Through this process known as remittances, millions of dollars are sent into the country every year, representing huge spending power. Here’s how they do it!
Reconnecting with Family
To send money back home, North Korean refugees must first contact their families. They hire brokers to find their relatives and arrange illicit phone calls close to the border with China, where smuggled Chinese cell phones can connect to international networks. In North Korea, people are often wary of such brokers, so they may have to be convinced with codewords or childhood nicknames that only the family would know, or recognizable handwriting and photos.
To avoid being caught, contact is often made from the mountain at night, or using a series of text or voice messages sent through apps like Wechat and quickly deleted. When the call finally happens, it can be emotional for both sides.
“You hear someone say, ‘Okay you’re connected, you can speak now.’ But no one says anything to each other. You just hear a high-pitched tone, and silence. Could this be real? You’re just crying, and can’t even speak.”
– Miso, escaped North Korea in 2010
How Remittances Work
There are different ways to send money to North Korea, but a simple version involves three parties: A North Korean resettled in South Korea, a remittance broker in North Korea, and the recipient in North Korea.
- A resettled North Korean, makes a request to a remittance broker to arrange a transfer. They wire money to a Chinese account controlled by that broker.
- The remittance broker in North Korea uses a smuggled Chinese phone to confirm receipt of the funds.
- After taking a hefty commission, they give cash to the refugee’s family. The family can confirm receipt of the money by sending a photo, video, or voice message back, so the sender can be confident that they’ve not been scammed.
With this process, the remittance broker in North Korea occasionally needs to replenish their cash on hand. This could happen through the physical smuggling of cash, but oftentimes money from their Chinese bank account is used to buy goods in China that are then sold in North Korea, generating cash. In this way, physical money never actually has to cross borders.
The Power to Change Lives
North Korea is one of the poorest countries in the world, whereas South Korea is one of the richest. Therefore remittances from relatives in South Korea or elsewhere can be absolutely transformative. The money is spent on almost everything, including food, clothing, shoes, medicine, housing, transport, and bribes to keep the family safe.
“I’ve sent money back to North Korea ever since I resettled in South Korea. I send an average of $1,500 a year. My parents used the money to buy a house! They’re also going to use it to help my younger brother escape and come to South Korea.”
– Jeonghyuk, resettled North Korean refugee
With new resources also comes new opportunities. North Koreans who never had the means before can now think about starting a business at the Jangmadang, or market. Since the collapse of the regime’s socialist economy in the 1990s, the markets have become essential to making a living. The flow of remittances is increasing trade, food security, marketization, and entrepreneurship, empowering ordinary North Koreans to gain autonomy.
A Ripple Effect
Along with money, North Korean refugees send back news and information from the outside world. At first, family members back home may not want to hear about life beyond the border. Decades of propaganda villainizing the outside world can be difficult to overcome, and if caught in communication with defectors, they could face serious punishment.
But as money continues to flow in, many people can’t help but be curious- what do their relatives outside do to make a living? What kind of house do they live in? Is life there like the K-dramas smuggled into North Korea? Conversely, defectors ask their family members, what they can do with the money in North Korea? This exchange of information is incredibly valuable, providing a glimpse into the most closed society on earth.
The flow of information into North Korea erodes the regime’s propaganda and changes worldviews. As the people learn more about the wealth and opportunities of the outside world, some may also risk their lives to escape. Money sent from remittances can also be used to fund this dangerous journey.
“When I first contacted my family back in North Korea after I resettled in South Korea, they didn’t believe that I was doing well here. My parents even resented me a little for leaving. But after I sent them money and told them more about my life here, their views changed. Now they realize that the regime has been lying to them and they’re not as loyal anymore. I have become a pioneer of freedom to my family back in North Korea.”
– Jo Eun, rescued by LiNK in 2017
Agents of Change
Remittances are about more than just the movement of money. Refugees who have been separated from their families aren’t able to go back home themselves, but can still care for their loved ones in some way. Every phone call into the country and every dollar sent back represents one small step towards the day when the North Korean people finally achieve their freedom.
More than 33,000 North Korean refugees have made it to freedom, and although it has become more difficult during the pandemic, surveys report that 65.7% have sent money back to North Korea. At LiNK, we’re committed to working with and building the capacity of North Korean refugees so they can succeed in their new lives and make an even bigger impact in their communities and on this issue.
