Abstract
By citing North Korean sources, the South Korean media have recently delivered the news that Kim Jong Il had already chosen his third son, Kim Jong Un, as his political successor in late 2008 or early 2009. He selected a son who was still young and inexperienced. What was the reason behind this decision? This paper attempts to provide a convincing answer to this perplexing question. According to institutionalists, individual actors develop an institution, and the institution in turn affects the actors and restrains their choices. We argue that, among the many political institutions in North Korea, those closely linked to the cult of the Kim Il Sung family are directly related to the logic behind the political succession decision. The institutionalization of the cult of the family provides a justification for political succession in the state. Kim Jong Il has been one of the chief architects of the institutionalization of the cult, and the institutionalization in turn has limited his choice in selecting his successor, leading to the recent dynastic decision.
Notes
1. An Yong-hyon, “Kim Ok Who Plays a Role as Kim Jong Il's Wife Attended a Meeting between Kim and Hyon Chong-un,” Chosun Ilbo, December 1, 2009, http://news.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2009/12/01/2009120100100.html?srchCol=news&srchUrl=news2 (accessed December 2, 2009). It is known to the outside world that Kim Jong Il has three sons: Kim Chong Nam, Chong Chol, and Chong Un.
2. North Korea has not disclosed Kim Chong Un's exact age. He is known to have been born either in 1983 or 1984.
3. Chong Song-jang, “The Succession Issue of North Korea under the Kim Jong Il Era,” Korean Political Science Review (Summer 2005): 345–65; Jae-Cheon Lim, Kim Jong Il's Leadership of North Korea (London: Routledge, 2009), 176–7; Ken E. Gause, “Can the North Korean Regime Survive Kim Jong Il?” Korean Journal of Defense Analysis 20, no. 2 (June 2008): 93–111; and Seung Joo Baek, “Prospects on Characteristics of the North Korean Succession System and its Foreign Policy in the Post-Kim Jong Il Era,” Korean Journal of Defense Analysis 20, no. 3 (September 2008): 215–30. Among these, Gause and Baek provide several succession scenarios that might unfold in North Korea's future.
4. Peter A. Hall and Rosemary C. R. Taylor, “Political Science and the Three New Institutionalisms,” Political Science 44, no. 5 (1996): 939–40; and James G. March and Johan P. Olsen, “The New Institutionalism: Organizational Factors in Political Life,” The American Political Science Review 78, no. 3 (September 1984): 738–40.
5. Philip Selznick, The Moral Commonwealth: Social Theory and the Promise of Community (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1992), 232.
6. W. Richard Scott, Institutions and Organizations: Ideas and Interests, 3rd edn (Los Angeles, CA: SAGE Publications, 2008), 124.
7. Selznick, The Moral Commonwealth, 232.
8. B. R. Myers conducted recent research on the leaders’ image-making. B. R. Myers, The Cleanest Race: How North Koreans See Themselves—Why It Matters (New York: Melville House, 2010), 93–127.
9. Dae-Sook Suh, Kim Il Sung: The North Korean Leader (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988), 1–2.
10. Dae-Sook Suh, Kim Il Sung: The North Korean Leader (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988), 123–57; and Andrei Lankov, From Stalin to Kim Il Sung: The Formation of North Korea, 1945–1960 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2002).
11. Cho Un-hui, “A Study of Symbolization of Revolutionary Tradition in North Korea,” (Ph.D. diss., Ewha Womans University, 2007), 48.
12. Most figures who were eliminated from the party were former members of the Kapsan Operation Committee. The committee was an anti-Japanese underground organization in the mid-1930s. Kapsan is an area in the North Hamgyong Province of North Korea. Lim, Kim Jong Il's Leadership of North Korea, 37–42.
13. Hwang Chang-yop, I Saw the Truth of History (Seoul: Hanul, 1999), 149 and 173.
14. Kim Chin-gye, Fatherland: Recollection of a North Korean Citizen, vol. 2 (Seoul: Hyonjang munhak, 1990), 85.
15. Kim Jong Il, “On Some Problems of Broadcasting,” July 30, 1967, Kim Jong Il Selected Works, vol. 1 (Pyongyang: Choson nodongdang chulpansa, 1992), 287.
16. Chae Chu-song, “She is the Mother of All of Us: Recollecting Madame Kang Pan-sok,” Nodong sinmun, July 31, 1967.
17. Mangyongdae is known to be the birthplace of Kim Il Sung and the place where he spent his childhood. It is located in Pyongyang.
18. Cho, A Study of Symbolization of Revolutionary Tradition, 58.
19. Han Yong-jin, “What does North Korea do on Kim Il Sung's Birthday?” DailyNK [online], April 14, 2005, http://www.dailynk.com/korean/read.php?cataId=nk01300&num=4228 (accessed December 6, 2009).
20. Tak Jin, Kim Gang Il and Pak Hong Je, Great Leader: Kim Jong Il, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Sorinsha, 1985), 168.
21. Sinpa County was renamed as Kim Chong Suk County in 1981. Korean Central Yearly Book (KCYB) 1983 (Pyongyang: Korean Central News Agency, 1983), 250–2.
22. Kim Il Sung had two brothers, Chol Chu and Yong Ju: see Invincible Revolutionary Fighter Comrade Kim Chol Chu (Pyongyang: Choson nondongdang chulpansa, 1975); and KCYB 1977 (Pyongyang: Korean Central News Agency, 1977), 127–8.
23. Cho, A Study of Symbolization of Revolutionary Tradition, 162.
24. People's Leader, vol. 1 (Pyongyang: Choson nodongdang chulpansa, 1982).
25. Tak Jin, Kim Gang Il and Pak Hong Je, Kim Jong Il Leader, vol. 1 (Pyongyang: Tongbangsa, 1984), 3–4. Kim Jong Il was actually born in the Russian Maritime Province. Lim, Kim Jong Il's Leadership of North Korea, 10–13.
26. KCYB 1992 (Pyongyang: Korean Central News Agency, 1992), 179–80.
27. History Research Center of Social Sciences Institute, Choson chonsa 13 (Pyongyang: Sahoe kwahakwon yoksa yon'guso, 1980), 76–9.
28. Yim Yong-chol, Child Revolutionary Comrade Kim Ki-song (Pyongyang: Kumsong chong'yon chulpansa, 1993); and Han Chae-man, Kim Jong Il: Individual, Thought, and Leadership (Pyongyang: Pyongyang chulpansan, 1994), 9–26.
29. KCYB 1995–2008 (Pyongyang: Korean Central News Agency, 1995–2008).
30. Pak Song-guk, “Disclosed Cult Song Words for Kim Chong Un, Palkorum (Footsteps),” DailyNK [online], June 2, 2009, http://www.dailynk.com/korean/read.php?cataId=nk00100&num=72229 (accessed December 16, 2009). In 2010, the North unofficially preserved Kim Chong Un's birthday as a holiday. His birthday is January 8. Chu Song-ha, “North Koreans Who Took a Two-day Break on Kim Chong Un's Birthday,” Dong-a Ilbo, January 11, 2010, http://news.donga.com/Politics/New/3/00/20100111/25321285/1&top=1 (accessed January 14, 2010).
31. Ko Yong-hui was born in Japan in 1953 and moved to the North. Kim Jong Il and Ko have two sons: Chong Chol and Chong Un; see Lim, Kim Jong Il's Leadership of North Korea, 101; and Fujimoto Kenji, Kim Jong Il's Cook, translated by Sin Hyo-won (Seoul: Wolgan Chosonsa, 2003), 135–7. In 2002, there was a source of Ko's cult, designating her as a “respected mother” and comparing Ko with Kim Jong Il's mother Kim Chong Suk. However, since then, the cult of Ko has not been systematically developed in the North: Respected Mother is the Most Loyal of Loyal Subjects toward the Honorable Comrade Commander-in-Chief (Pyongyang: Chosŏn inmin'gun, 2002). This pamphlet was reprinted in the South Korean monthly magazine Wolgan Choson, March 2003, 120–30.
32. Scott, Institutions and Organizations, 50–9.
33. Scott, Institutions and Organizations, 52.
34. Lim, Kim Jong Il's Leadership of North Korea, 65.
35. Mun Un-hye, “Kim Il Sung's Picture Could Not Be as Important as Rice,” DailyNK [online], June 11, 2007, http://www.dailynk.com/korean/read.php?cataId=nk01300&num=42116 (accessed December 7, 2009).
36. Scott, Institutions and Organizations, 54–5.
37. Hyung-chan Kim and Dong-kyu Kim, Human Remolding in North Korea: A Social History of Education (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2005), 195, 204, and 222.
38. Kim Un-sim, “She Was Nine Years Old,” Choson: Hwabo, June 2006, 15. Choson: Hwabo is a North Korean monthly journal.
39. Scott, Institutions and Organizations, 56–7.
40. Jae Jean Suh, The Impact of Personality Cult in North Korea (Seoul: Korea Institute for National Unification, 2004), 1.
41. Thomas Carlyle, On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History (Middlesex, TW: The Echo Library, 2007), 4 and 11.
42. Han, Kim Jong Il, 16–26; People's Leader, 17–24; and The Sun of Leading, General Kim Jong Il (Pyongyang: Pyongyang Press, 1995), 31–4.
43. Chong Chin-hyok, The Greatest Heroic Family (Pyongyang: Pyongyang chulpansa, 2002), 6–21; Tak et al., Kim Jong Il Leader, 3–8; The Sun of Leading, General Kim Jong Il, 25–31; and O Myong-chol, The Son of Partisans (Pyongyang: Pyongyang Press, 2003), 2–13.
44. Kim had been engaged in guerrilla activity near Mt Paekdu within the Chinese territory between 1932 and 1940.
45. Chong, The Greatest Heroic Family, 18.
46. Chong, The Greatest Heroic Family, 38–49; and O, The Son of Partisans, 9–13 and 196–200.
47. Patricia H. Thornton and William Ocasio, “Institutional Logics and the Historical Contingency of Power in Organizations: Executive Succession in the Higher Education Publishing Industry, 1958–1990,” The American Journal of Sociology 105, no. 3 (November 1999): 806.
48. Han, Kim Jong Il, 62.
49. Richard Rose, “Monarchy, Constitutional,” in Political Philosophy: Theories, Thinkers, and Concepts, ed. Seymour Martin Lipset (Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2001), 442.
50. Madeleine Albright, Madam Secretary (New York: Miramax Books, 2003), 466.
51. Lim, Kim Jong Il's Leadership of North Korea, 176–7.
52. Kim Il Sung, With the Century, vol. 8 (Pyongyang: Choson nodongdang chulpansa, 1999), 308–9.
53. The members of the National Defense Commission include Cho Myong Nok (1st Vice-Chairman), Yi Yong Mu, Kim Yong Chun, O Kuk Nyol (Vice-Chairmen), Chon Pyong Ho, Paek Se Bong, Chang Song Taek, Chu Sang Song, U Tong Chuk, Chu Kyu Chang, and Kim Chong Gak (Commissioners). Kim Kyong Hui, Kim Jong Il's sister, and her associates are also the main supporters of the succession.