A Few Thoughts on North Korea’s Travel Pass System
Open Radio has a good primer on the system North Korea uses to keep people in their home provinces. The effect, intended I suppose, is to make North Korean society like an ice cube tray, where in theory, each area is isolated from the others, and from any news, rumors, grumbles, woes, and potential expressions of dissent that might emanate from there. It also serves to limit trade that could challenge the government’s control over the distribution of things the people need.
For your consideration: if the North Koreans are counterfeiting our currency, in what sense would it be wrong for us to counterfeit and introduce fake travel passes to the North Korean black market, a market that continues to develop in spite of the regime’s best efforts to strangle it?
Didn’t China at one time, until fairly recently, have something like this in place? Asking, not saying, and certainly not trying to justify it (though it could partly explain the formation or existence of the policy).
It occurred to me that the existence of such a system might, following the collapse of the regime in Pyongyang, make it easier for Seoul to stave off a mass exodus to the South, as well as make it easier to spread around any aid and assistance that’s needed.
But, more importantly, without creating the resentment (that could prove hazardous later) that would come if Seoul had imposed such a system from without.
China still maintains residency permit requirements, which shut out many migrant worker families from public housing, public schools, and free vaccinations. In the eastern coastal city where I used to live, Uighur migrant children could be seen roaming the streets during the day because they cannot attend public schools, and their parents, who tend to have larger families because they’re not bound by the one-child policy, cannot afford private school tuition.
But it’s not as strict now as in North Korea, where one can expect to be blocked from traveling outside one’s administrative sphere, right?
I seem to recall back in the 1990s when I visited China as a college student, that one could not travel by train to places outside one’s province unless one had the proper authorized documents. Was that the case then, or was I mistaken? Is it the case at all right now?
The hukou system has in fact lost some grip on the population. The system is not really thought as travel but as a residence permit. For instance, most of the rural population may make a train ride to beijing, but it is still impossible for them to register to the councils there, so the doors of cities are still closed in a sense that they may not claim citizenships and obtain services and working titles from local authorities. They are still “no one” in these cities. This system may also be accounted for the unavoidable return of the migrant workers who built the olympic “village” once their duty was completed.
Yes, I seem to recall another 2009 report from Good Friends which confirms and updates the fact that, as Kuchibo said, one can expect to be blocked from traveling outside one’s administrative sphere in North Korea (obviously for the reasons outlined by Joshua above), so flooding these provinces with fake travel passes would be a good, creative approach (great idea, Joshua). Not sure about China, though.
Also, during the 1990’s, the Daily North Korea reported that many of the “famine” victims were intellectuals, who were banished to the “countryside” .
@Irene Also, during the 1990’s, the Daily North Korea reported that many of the “famine†victims were intellectuals, who were banished to the “countryside†.
Gives whole new meaning to the phrase “brain drain.”
Regarding the movement issue, it seems that accelerated army recruiting in border provinces like Ryanggang is one way of still keeping tabs on people.
@kushiboIt occurred to me that the existence of such a system might, following the collapse of the regime in Pyongyang, make it easier for Seoul to stave off a mass exodus to the South, as well as make it easier to spread around any aid and assistance that’s needed.
Fascinating point by kushibo here. I’m no occupationaire and wary of speculating about hypotheticals for fear of getting labeled as a “presentist historian,” but this is one debate that would be sure to occur: to what extent, and for how long, should DPRK officials be kept in place in the event of a collapse?
I would imagine that the failures of arbitrary de-Baathification in Iraq (and the relative success, though Chinese and Koreans were upset about it at the time, of the policy of administrative continuity in the aftermath of Japan’s defeat) would argue for the continuity approach. Let’s hope that whomever is in charge at that point will heed Andrei Lankov’s wisdom and figure out a pragmatic policy toward people in positions of administrative responsibility in the KPA and the Workers’ Party, given the comparative advantages of such a policy. The alternative is to assume the complete collapse of their system (somewhat unlikely given that it survived even the Korean War and that provincial governments may have their own plans for survival) compounded by its active destruction and putting them all on trial (which would take several years, given the degree to which the Party has penetrated society). Or perhaps there is a middle road.
I think that any discussion of the “NK collapse with occupation by US/ROK/PRC/UN/whoever TBD scenario” points to a certain weakness in the movement surrounding the refugee issue and resistance to the regime of Kim Jong Il: As deeply learned and as dedicated as many advocates are, very few people have taken the time to study the first U.S. occupation of North Korea in fall 1950. Admittedly things have changed a great deal in the intervening years — such as the communications environment, the erosion of trust among North Koreans in their government — but as far as I know, no one is reading lots of Bruce Cumings, National Archives documents, and South Korean historical reports in order to knock out blog entries on what an occupation of North Korea has actually entailed.
Same thing with “the Great North Korean Rebellion” scenario. But now I’m just begging you to read my academic articles, which are not online and really just bullshit compendia of Soviet occupation/US intelligence/NK captured/Chinese archives on the topic. Relevant historical scholarship can be a bit of an oxymoron.
Maybe this kind of careful consideration is happening at Naval War College or West Point, but I haven’t seen it, and it would seem to be an important aspect to consider — what are the consequences if Joshua’s desired scenario occurs?
Sig Harrison tries to bring it up with Dana Rohrabacher in Feb 2009 testimony, but Dana didn’t care to follow the logic of his own tough talk.
Naturally, with its censorship instincts honed up in a desire to stay focused on reveling in its own splendor on October 1, the Chinese government doesn’t want to talk about it, either, but one never knows with the Chinese. As Jack Pritchard’s memoir of Bush 43 Term I-era negotiations confirms, public declarations and private assurances are often very different things, and the Chinese are capable of pragmatism on the North Korean issue.
Fortunately Joshua has provided a reluctant quasi-endorsement of Pritchard‘s reliability in a typically complex, erudite, and yet knee-slapping post from May 2008 which I excerpt here:
Pritchard is a smart man who happens to be right this time, but agreeing with him gives me a sensation of uncomfortable confluence I haven’t felt since a time some years ago when I shared a Greyhound bus with a flamboyant transvestite and his/her companion.
Now, as regards Chinese discussion regime change in North Korea, in the topsy-turvy logic of CCP propaganda, the very idea that someone is writing “we shouldn’t talk about it” means ipso facto that someone important is indeed talking about it. Selig Harrison’s so-called “reform faction” in North Korea may indeed be phantoms, but submerged divergences of opinion on China’s Politburo (even within the Foreign Ministry) as regards foreign affairs are commonplace, and this extends to North Korean policy. Yes, it is frustrating to watch, but if the North Korea issue rises to the appropriate level of urgency in the much larger (and recently somewhat roiled) U.S.-China military relationship, then we may actually see some coordination. Generals arriving at the Six Party Talks, anyone?