Starting in May, North Korean authorities plan to restrict and severely crackdown on teens and 20-somethings involved in commercial activities at markets, Daily NK has learned.
This development comes as the authorities continue efforts to prevent “ideological laxity” among young people in the country.
A source in North Hamgyong Province told Daily NK on Friday that inminban (people’s units) in Hoeryong held meetings regarding these plans on Apr. 18. The meetings informed locals that in accordance with an Apr. 11 decision, the authorities would crack down on people in their teens and 20s engaging in marketplace commerce, and that young people caught doing business would be subject to “legal punishments.”
According to the source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, a growing number of teens are paying their way out Socialist Patriotic Youth League activities, citing economic difficulties as an excuse. Even teenagers who have yet to graduate high school are engaging in commerce in marketplaces and alleyways.
People in their 20s are also shirking the country’s “organizational life” to do business, particularly young women.
North Korean women in their 20s openly say that doing what the party says is the “road to starvation,” and are aggressively jumping into commercial activity to prepare for marriage or put together seed money for their future, the source said.
He further noted that North Korean women inevitably engage in commerce to earn money for their families as they are subject to less organizational control than the male heads of households, who are generally tied to the military or other organizations. As a result, young women are actively engaging in marketplace commerce.
Since the “Arduous March” period of the 1990s, when the state distribution system collapsed, the vitality and economic power of women has tended to keep families afloat. This is also why many of the donju (North Korea’s wealthy entrepreneurial class) are women.
The source said young people have watched the previous generation make a living and even grow wealthy through commerce. As such, they strongly believe they must make money to survive in a country where the distribution system has collapsed. This has motivated a lot of young people everywhere to dive into business, he added.
However, North Korean authorities regard young people shirking “organizational life” to do business as a serious problem. The authorities regard commercial activities as anti-party, anti-revolutionary, and anti-socialist behavior that runs counter to party policy, and are intensifying their efforts to curb such behavior.
These efforts on the part of the government appear aimed at preventing ideological laxity on the part of young people – an issue directly tied to regime survival – by ensuring that those of them engaged in commerce cannot escape state control.
However, many North Koreans are taking a dim view of the government’s efforts to control the market activities of young people. What difference does age make, they ask, when we all have to make a living in the same world? They also say young people not even out of school — who should be enjoying themselves and full of hope for the future — would not be doing business in markets unless they faced difficult circumstances.
Translated by David Black. Edited by Robert Lauler.
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