Recovering from the "Arduous March"?
Résumé
In the mid-1990s, North Korea went through its biggest economic crisis, known by its government as the «Arduous March». North Korea’s was forced adopt alternate strategies in order to survive and black markets (jangmadang) appeared nationwide, even in Pyongyang. North Korean’s government tolerated these alternative activities, since it had few options and lacked capability. Such spaces generated a unique opportunity for North Korean citizens to earn their own money and savings and soon, they sought investment opportunities (Lee Chul, 2016). Though the government’s failure of provision shattered any faith its population had in its capabilities, North Korean society has been deeply transformed and Pyongyang adapted its political strategy in order to respond to its population’s changed conception and demands with regards to living standards. As a result, since the mid-2010s, Pyongyang’s cityscape has been completely reconfigured, similar to other post-socialist cities (Drummond and Douglas, 2020) with the construction of a series of residential districts in the historical downtown area (Yim Dongwoo, 2017). Simultaneously, the development of leisure spaces has been a part of Pyongyang’s process of modernization and living standards enhancement.
This paper will consider how the consequences of the «Arduous March» and the reconfiguration afterwards affected the structure of Pyongyang itself by analyzing the new urban projects, especially those constructed after Kim Jong Un’s rise to power in 2011 and connecting them to an analysis of the recent development of leisure parks and leisure practices in order to understand the economic and social changes in the North Korean society.
Domaines
Géographie
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