No Motherland Without You: The Feminine Pastoral in North Korean Food & Agricultural Propaganda

| The North Korean ruling regime has historically taken an official stance on women’s equality that falls in line with socialist progressivism while also incorporating more conservative elements from Confucian thought and the Kims’ own brand of ‘juche’ nationalism. This essay looks at examples of food and agriculture related propaganda issued by the North Korean government within the context of its statements on gender and the circumstances arising from the food shortages of the past two decades. I argue that the regime’s manipulation of signs reveals deeply patriarchal attitudes that have legitimized the domination of women and land in addition to facilitating a denial of internal conflict and disorder. A s a subject of documentary and journalistic coverage, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) is often portrayed as a country beyond rationalization, of energies squanderedon spectacle while the majority of its citizens lead lives of hidden hardship. Images disseminated by the North Korean regime of Pyongyang’s towering monuments or highly choreographed mass games are interpreted in the West with the implicit understanding that they are merely a cover for the consequences that decades of reckless totalitarian governance and extreme cultural, political, and economic isolation have wrought on the country. As amusing as these representations may seem to us for their inability to comprehend their own irony, it is also necessary to remember that propaganda is not merely a defense mechanism or a means of deflecting scrutiny. It also gives legible form to abstract political ideology and sets utopian imperatives for a targeted citizenry. Propaganda in the DPRK may not reflect the living conditions of most North Koreans, but it does create a space in which to conceive of the nation beyond the actualities of everyday life, giving ideological justification to unacknowledged problems such as hunger and impoverishment. 1 It has been argued that the North Korean regime, founded by Kim Il-sung and continued by his hereditary successors Kim Jong-il and Kim Jong-un, has managed to hold on to its leadership precisely because of its success in implementing mechanisms of control over both its own citizens and in the nation’s representation abroad: “restrictive social policies; manipulation of ideas and information; use of force; co-optation; manipulation of foreign governments; and institutional coup-proofing” (Byman and Lind 45). These strategies have helped to sustain the Kims’ continued rule despite the humanitarian crises that have afflicted the nation and raised the threat of collapse or revolt. The DPRK’s ongoing food shortages and problems of chronic malnutrition have presented an internal challenge to national security, with the devastating famine of the mid-1990s representing the apex of this turmoil. The North Korean government has generally responded to and discussed the food problem by downplaying its severity through euphemism, referring to the famine as konan-ui haenggun (“arduous march”). Rather than addressing the situation directly, it has focused instead on official campaigns promoting productivity and self-sufficiency. The regime has displaced any possible unrest by insisting on the attainability of affluence through hard work, holding up the ideals of national pride, self-reliance, and self-determination encompassed by juche, Kim Il-sung’s foundational thesis on the central role of individual responsibility in promoting of Korean interests. 2