The NGO experience in North Korea

Address on the NGO experience in North Korea as well as the current state of the country's development

04.11.2003 · Improving Responsiveness

On November 4, 2003, L. Gordon Flake, Executive Director of the Mike and Maureen Mansfield Foundation, Scott Snyder, from the Asia Foundation, and Michael Schloms from the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung visited C·A·P. After announcing the recent publication of their book, "Paved with Good Intentions. The NGO Experience in North Korea," the three gentlemen participated in an address in which they discussed the experiences of US, South Korean, and European nongovernmental organizations in North Korea.

The work of foreign NGOs is eyed with great scepticism from North Korea, especially because the concept of "Nongovernmental Organization" in a totalitarian regime like North Korea is nonexistent. Thus the foreign NGOs are more often treated like foreign state delegations. In particular, NGOs from the US and South Korea are subject to continual suspicion, which among other things meant that they are not allowed a permanent working place in North Korea. Although South Korean developmental help organizations have received relatively good access to North Korea under the Sunshine policy, North Korea has concentrated significantly since mid 2002 on state research programs and fostered sharp distrust against South Korea NGOs. However European NGOs, which are deemed to be less dangerous, have enjoyed more freedom in comparison to South Korea and the US, for example, the privilege of having a permanent working place in North Korea.

A considerable problem for all NGOs in this area is not only the persistent state monitoring, but the limited access to the people. A need assessment, for example, of nourishment help can not be coordinated with the hungry; rather it must be worked upon within the state guidelines. The same goes for implementation analyses. Nevertheless it can be said that the work of foreign development help organizations has, up to now, averted a new famine.

Regarding US politics against North Korea, the speakers saw two situations in the US: One view has held North Korea as untrustworthy and thus rejects all concessions; the other view sees the North Korean nuclear armament as a self-fulfilling prophecy of aggressive North Korea politics which began with the arrival of the Bush Administration. But even if the breakdown of North Korea is more clear and probable today than ten years ago, it appears as if the country will not break apart of its own accord. The real question rather is how the US will act in the case of a North Korean atomic test, and if and how the US could expedite the collapse of this last, Stalinistic regime.

PAVED WITH GOOD INTENTIONS.
The NGO Experience in North Korea
Edited by L. Gordan Flake and Scott Snyder
Praeger Publishers, Westport 2003
ISBN 0-275-98157-6