What Lessons Does the Political Transition in 1989 Central and Eastern Europe Offer for Health System Reform in a Changed North Korea?

POLITICAL TRANSITIONS ARE COMPLEX In 1964, the then British Prime Minister Harold Wilson is reported to have said that “a week is a long time in politics”.1 He was reminding his listeners that sometimes things can change incredibly quickly. Thirty years ago, the political landscape of Europe changed profoundly in the course of a few months. In May 1989 the Hungarian government began to dismantle the section of the Iron Curtain that separated it from its neighbours in the West. Large numbers of East Germans took advantage of this to flee to the Federal Republic of Germany and, one after another, the communist regimes of Central and Eastern Europe collapsed, bring to an end the division of Europe that had lasted for forty years. It had been clear for a long time that the post-war division of Europe was not sustainable. Dissent was growing. However, no one could have predicted the course of events that ensued.