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How does North Korea Use Their Landscapes as a Means of Governance? : Based on field guidance reports in Rodong Sinmun

AHN JIN HEE 1

1기술사사무소 이수

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This study seeks to explore the ways in which North Korea utilizes their landscapes as a means of governance. To this end, Kim Jong-Il and Kim Jong-Eun’s field guidance reports over the same number of months were analyzed according to ‘the ways they connect with the landscape’, ‘the types of landscape’ and ‘the areas where the landscape is located’. As a result, differences in how the two regimes utilize landscape are identified through the leader’s backdrop. The backdrop of the Kim Jong-Il regime was a landscape painting that was static to the reception area. The Kim Jong-Eun regime, on the other hand, replaces backdrop with the landscape located in the background of the ruler in the photographs of the Rodong Sinmun’s field guidance reports. Next, a pattern of avoidance of economic conditions can be found in the landscape represented in the media of the two regimes. In the media, Kim Jong-Il is emphasized to push ahead with tough terrain despite the bad weather to take care of the struggling economy. Kim Jong-Eun has kept the new and large-scale landscapes, close through the field guidances. However, far away from the landscapes, which can be responsible for solving the problem. The strategy of going directly to the site, but remaining symbolic rather than a practical solver was implemented by adopting mobility in different directions by the two regimes. Each of these is human mobility and landscape mobility.

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.