North Korea’s uniquely extreme isolation and disparity of power and wealth means you have to think of it differently than most other countries. Today I’ll present a toy idea not for serious consideration as is, but to provoke thought and promote new, potentially effective ideas or improve other plans. I call it a toy idea so no one accidentally takes it seriously on its own, but plays with it to[…] Keep reading →

Today’s pictures were from the Grand People’s Study House, a giant library overlooking the Taedong River, with the Juche Tower on the other side. Sorry for how long some captions are. I formatted them to be more readable but WordPress seems to ignore the formatting. I hope you can read them okay anyway. Nearly all big public buildings we visited had big statues of Kim Il Sung, Kim Jung Il,[…] Keep reading →

Most people can think of reasons not to visit North Korea. Most people consider the place dangerous. They have imprisoned foreigners for life for things that we wouldn’t consider illegal here, and you have no right to due process. For starters. What do you get from visiting? If you travel to explore new places, North Korea is one of the few frontiers left that tourists haven’t overrun. Tourists are even[…] Keep reading →

To close out this fifteen-part series on strategy, what can one person as an individual do? First, I recommend considering you may be offering people unsolicited advice based on judgments they don’t agree with if you, say, waltz into the country and tell people there you are going to help them make their lives better. Now matter how sure you are that you will help them, if they didn’t invite[…] Keep reading →

If sunshine is the best disinfectant, then giving the North Korean people the same access that the rest of the world has to information about their country, its history, and the world would probably be the best strategy for change. Their compliance with their government effectively supports it more than anything else. That compliance makes sense, despite it appearing from our perspective against their long-term interests. Not complying can cost[…] Keep reading →

Here are the slides for my North Korea talk at Fred. I expect to show a lot of images, mainly from Joseph’s amazing pictures on Flickr. I like my pictures, but his are phenomenal. Here is a pdf of the slides. Sorry the transitions don’t make it in, but the slides are pretty light. I’ll put up the video when they post it.

I’ve written at length on this page on how I think direct interactions between North Korean people and people from the rest of the world increase communication and understanding between the two groups. I mentioned in my post on the ethics on visiting North Korea that I expect increasing tourism will open the country. I think such interactions could change North Korea, mainly by bringing new information to the population.[…] Keep reading →