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| Kim Il Sung with villagers |
by Dermot Hudson
The Juche Idea or Juche ideology has been the guiding idea of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) for many decades. But what does it mean?
Well, Juche is a Korean word of two syllables: “Ju” meaning one’s self, and “Che” which means master. In other words, it means “master of one’s self”.
Juche is synonymous with the DPRK. Without understanding the Juche idea, it is impossible to have any understanding of the DPRK. However, much of the media in the West and some so-called academic experts totally ignore the Juche idea in their discourse on the DPRK. Others show a crude and distorted understanding of the Juche idea which is essentially dismissive of it.
Frequently, Juche is described as meaning “self -reliance”. Self-reliance indeed forms a core part of the Juche idea but it has a far wider and deeper meaning.
A typical example of the Western mainstream media dismissal of Juche can be found in Reuters on September 14 2017. The article, written by Jack Kim and Kiyoshi Takenaka and syndicated in other publications, like the Daily Mirror, claimed that “Juche is the North’s ruling ideology that mixes Marxism and an extreme form of go-it-alone nationalism”. This is, of course, a caricature of the Juche idea.
At no point did any of the DPRK’s leaders ever say that the DPRK would or should “go it alone” – although at different moments in its history it has had to “go it alone” in order to survive.
An example of the latter was in 1962 when the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics suspended cooperation with the DPRK and imposed sanctions on it.
Worse are those who claim that Juche is a form of “ethno-nationalism,” or a “state religion” or even a “cult”.
A lot of misinformation about the Juche idea has been spread by American and European academics based in south Korea. Among them are B R Myers and Andrei Lankov, who are held up as “Korea experts” but actually know very little about the DPRK.
Even on the left in Western Europe and North America there exists a lot of ignorance and misunderstanding about the Juche idea.
The Juche idea was the brainchild of the DPRK’s founding father, Kim Il Sung, who led the anti-Japanese national liberation struggle.
The term “Juche” was first used publicly and explicitly in 1955 in a speech Kim Il Sung made to party ideological workers – titled On Eliminating Dogmatism and Formalism and Establishing Juche in Ideological Work. In his speech Kim asked “What is Juche in our Party’s ideological work? What are we doing? We are not engaged in any other country’s revolution, but solely in the Korean revolution. This, the Korean revolution, determines the essence of Juche in the ideological work of our Party. Therefore, all ideological work must be subordinated to the interests of the Korean revolution”.
At the time Kim Il Sung made the speech, there was an urgent need to clear away dogmatic and formalistic attitudes that were hindering the advance of the Korean revolution.
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea was blazing a new trail in the construction of socialism; ready-made formulas, therefore, did not fit.
Some dogmatists in the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea wanted to do everything according to old Marxist textbooks or to copy the experiences of the USSR.
However, the DPRK’s situation was different from other socialist countries; it was a divided country that had emerged from the ruins of Japanese colonialism and feudalism.
It was really impossible for the DPRK to follow the path of other countries. There was a need for independent and creative thinking and for the DPRK to assert its independence.
The assertion of the DPRK’s independence became more important than before because the Soviet Union, after the death of Stalin in March 1953, became revisionist and dropped its anti-imperialist stance and, later, the socialist camp and international communist movement was split into pro-Soviet and pro-Chinese wings. President Kim Il Sung pointed out that “in 1955, therefore, our Party set forth the definite policy of establishing Juche, and has been persistently urging an energetic ideological struggle to carry it through ever since. The year 1955 marked a turning point in our Party's consistent struggle against dogmatism. It was also at that time, in fact, that we started our struggle against modern revisionism that had emerged within the socialist camp. Our struggle against dogmatism was thus linked up with the struggle against modern revisionism".
Moreover, establishing Juche was essential as Korea was sandwiched between great powers and menaced by the US imperialists who had occupied southern Korea after 1945. In the past, Korea had lost independence due to the idea of relying on and fawning to big powers (known as flunkeyism in Korea).
The flunkeyist or sycophantic mentality had been deeply ingrained in the old feudal ruling class. In the closing years of the 19th century and the early 20th century, Korea’s feudal rulers had done virtually nothing to organize the work of defense against the menace of Japan.
The ruling class was split into pro-Russian, pro-Chinese, pro-American and pro-Japanese factions. Different big powers—such as Japan, the USA, China, Russia, Britain and France –aall coveted Korea; in the end, however, Korea was occupied and annexed by Japan.
The nationalist movement in Korea was also captivated by flunkeyism, the mentality of relying on big powers. Some wanted to rely on the Americans, believing in Woodrow Wilson’s doctrine of “self-determination” while others looked to Nationalist China or to the Soviet Union. Some even believed that the colonial suzerain Japan would grant independence to Korea if they begged hard enough.
Although Juche was first explicitly mentioned in 1955, in fact, it goes back much further. It was actually first outlined in an embryonic form by Kim Il Sung when he addressed a meeting of the leading activists and cadres of the Young Communist League of Korea and the Anti-Imperialist Youth League at Kalun, China, in June 1930 (many Koreans had been exiled to China in those days and many Korean independence activists were based in China). At the time, the Korean people were looking for a new way to successfully conduct the revolutionary struggle for independence and national liberation as well as for social justice.
The young Kim Il Sung keenly realised that a new path for the Korean revolution needed to be charted. He stressed that the Korean revolution should be carried out independently and by relying on the ordinary people, the popular masses.
In his speech, titled The Path of the Korean Revolution, he explained his ideas and put forward an independent line for the Korean revolution. He castigated those who believed in relying on big powers or splitting into many different factions:
“Experience shows that in order to lead the revolution to victory, one must go among the masses of people and organise them, and solve all problems arising in the course of the revolution independently on one’s own responsibility in accord with the actual conditions, instead of relying on others.
“Drawing on this lesson we regard it as most important to take the firm standpoint that the masters of the Korean revolution are the Korean people and that the Korean revolution should by all means be carried out by the Korean people themselves in a way suited to the actual conditions of their country”.
This is the basis of the Juche idea and its starting point. The idea that the masses are the masters of the revolution was first voiced at Kalun in 1930. Comrade Kim Il Sung also stressed that “The masters of the revolutionary struggle are the masses of the people, and only when they are organised and mobilised can they win the revolutionary struggle”.
Many years later, on September 171972, President Kim Il Sung explained to journalists of the Mainichi Shimbun, one of Japan’s major daily newspapers, that “in a nutshell, the idea of Juche means that the masters of the revolution and the work of construction are the masses of the people and that they are also the motive force of the revolution and the work of construction. In other words, one is responsible for one’s own destiny and one also has the capacity for hewing out one’s own destiny”.
Kim Il Sung also said that “independence is what keeps man alive. If he loses independence he cannot be called a man; he differs little from an animal”. This is a succinct elucidation of the humanistic and liberating nature of the Juche idea.
In March 1982, comrade Kim Jong Il, who was at the time Secretary for Organisational Affairs of the Workers’ Party of Korea, published the treatise On the Juche Idea, which explained and expounded the Juche idea in depth and in a systematic and structured form.
Comrade Kim Jong Il defined the Juche idea as having philosophical principles, socio-historical principles and guiding principles. The core principle of the Juche idea is that humans are the masters of everything and decide everything. In the work Kim Jong Il explained that man is a social being with the attributes of independence, creativity and consciousness, all of which were interrelated. The guiding principles of the Juche idea, which are applied concretely in practice, were: Juche in ideology, independence in politics, self-sufficiency in the economy, and self-reliance in national defence.
The Juche idea postulates that the masses are the subject of the revolution, not its object. Accordingly, in order to carry out the revolution, the masses should be awakened and should play the role of the masters of the revolution; therefore, priority should be given to ideological work. This is one of the main reasons why the DPRK did not collapse like the people’s democracies of Eastern Europe and the USSR.
Some self-styled “Leftist” detractors of the Juche idea, who reject the socialist experience of the DPRK, claim that “Juche rejects Marxism-Leninism.” This, however, is not true. In fact, Marxism-Leninism is an important component of Juche.
In his youth Kim Il Sung studied the works of Marx and Lenin, including Capital and The State and Revolution. Kim Jong Il himself pointed out that “our Party and people respect Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin as the leaders of the working class and speak highly of their distinguished service”. Moreover, the DPRK is one of the few countries in the world where you can take a university course in Marxism-Leninism and dialectical materialism. So it is a false statement that Marxism-Leninism has been rejected by the DPRK.
Nor is Juche simply narrow nationalism or a cover for nationalism. Kim Jong Il said in his work On the Juche Idea that “independence is not in conflict with internationalism but is the basis of its strengthening. Just as the world revolution is inconceivable without the revolution in one’s own country, internationalism divorced from independence cannot exist. As a matter of principle, internationalist solidarity must be based on freedom of choice and equality. Only when it is founded on independence will internationalist solidarity become based on free choice and equality and become genuine and durable”.
Guided by the Juche idea, the DPRK has always been internationalist. It has materially supported revolutionary and anti-imperialist struggles in many countries. A recent example is the assistance given to the Russian Federation in its defensive actions in the Kursk region . In the 1960s President Kim Il Sung sent pilots of the air force of the Korean People’s Army as well as artillery troops and tunnelling experts to assist the Vietnamese people in their liberation war against US imperialism. The KPA Air Force also assisted Egypt and Syria in the 1973 Middle East October war against the Zionist aggressors. In 1962 when Cuba was stabbed in the back by the Soviet Union DPRK under the leadership of the great leader President Kim Il Sung provided internationalist support for Cuba during its hour of need, gave political and military assistance, while sending food and tractors and technicians. The DPRK also publicly supported the five-point demands of Fidel Castro which included the US withdrawal from Guantanamo Bay. Another example of DPRK internationalism is that President Kim Il Sung had construction experts sent to Grenada and the DPRK gave a generous amount of military aid to the People's Revolutionary Government of Grenada , in fact in per capita terms the DPRK gave more aid to Grenada than the USSR did.
The Juche idea is the secret weapon of the DPRK which has enabled it to not only survive in difficult circumstances but to thrive and prosper. Thanks to the application of the Juche idea the DPRK was able to maintain independence.
Indeed, former British Prime Minister John Major paid an unusual backhanded compliment to the DPRK when he said it was a “country with undiluted independence”.
The DPRK does not have foreign troops stationed on its soil. It is not a member of the IMF, World Bank, World Trade Organisation (WTO), World Economic Forum (WEF) or Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC).
It has been able to build an independent national economy and industrialise despite being under blockade and sanctions by the USA since almost day one, as well as increasingly by the United Nations Security Council since 2006.
The Soviet big-power chauvinists and modern revisionists tried to subordinate the DPRK economy to their own but Kim Il Sung was having none of it and adhered to the line of economic independence.The USSR tried to induce the DPRK to join the Soviet-led Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA also known as Comecon in the West) by offering electricity from the Lake Baikal power station. But Kim Il Sung told them “we will not use electricity generated by the power station; if we become dependent on electricity from you and then you fail to supply it, then we would suffer greatly; if we have funds for transmission cables from the power station to our country, it would be more effective for us to use these funds to build another hydroelectric power station in our country. It has become more clear today that our decision to build socialism by our own efforts on the principle of self-reliance and not enter the CMEA was quite correct".
The DPRK put self-reliance into effect in many fields. It achieved self-sufficiency in grain in the early 1960s. The DPRK produced its own "Juche Fibre ", Vinalonm, which was invented by a south Korean scientist Dr Ri Sung Gi, who defected to the north during the Korean War. Vinalon is fibre produced from the anthracite and limestone abundant in the DPRK.In his lifetime, Ri used to say “if the coming generations ask about the history of vinalon, please tell them about the history of the Workers’ Party of Korea founded and led by great leader Kim Il Sung, not about the name of a scientist or a technician.Then they will come to know how vinalon could be born in this era”.
The DPRK also found ways of producing iron without coking coal. During the period of socialist industrialisation , industrial output value grew by an astonishing 19.1 per cent per annum. Under the leadership of the great leader President Kim Il Sung, the Korean people built a powerful independent national economy that can turn out all sorts of products from wrist watches to large railway locomotives.
The DPRK has been able to manage with its borders closed between January 2020 and February 2024 during the Covid pandemic when others would be lucky to last beyond a couple of days. At the same time and despite the sanctions, the DPRK has been able to maintain an impressive social programme, with free medical care, free education up to university level, free housing, low-cost public transport and other measures but without levying tax on citizens as this was abolished in 1974.
In the past few years, a massive housing construction program has been carried out not just in Pyongyang but in rural areas.
Thus, the Juche idea has produced tangible results in the DPRK. There is no doubt that the DPRK’s socialism is the most durable socialism.
Therefore, it is not surprising that, since the 1960s, groups for the Study of the Juche Idea have appeared in many countries. The first one was founded in Mali in 1969; in 1978, the International Institute of the Juche Idea was established, with headquarters in Tokyo, Japan.
As Dr Vishwanath, director of the International Institute of the Juche idea, once said, “Study the Juche idea; it will cost you nothing but pay in plenty”.
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