Thinkers and political figures
Portrait: Photograph, 1950, via Wikimedia Commons (opens in a new tab) · Public domain
Kim Il-sung
- Country
- North Korea
- Era
- 1912–1994
- Tradition
- Juche, hereditary totalitarianism
Founder of North Korea, who launched the Korean War, built the most closed state in the world around the doctrine of Juche, and established the only hereditary communist dynasty.
01
Documented positions
Documented positions come from the sources listed. Similarity is this project’s inference from those positions, and is a much weaker claim.
- Launched the invasion of South Korea in June 1950 with Soviet and Chinese approval
- Formulated Juche — national self-reliance in ideology, defence and economy — as the state doctrine replacing Marxism-Leninism
- Collectivised all agriculture and nationalised all industry, eliminating private commerce entirely
- Built a comprehensive personality cult and a hereditary succession, unique among communist states
- Created the songbun system classifying every citizen by inherited political loyalty, determining housing, work and food
- Operated a network of political prison camps holding whole families under the principle of collective guilt
- Maintained a formally non-aligned position between the Soviet Union and China while accepting aid from both
02
Where it sits on each dimension
Wealth and inequality
2
RedistributionMarket outcomes
Evidence: Well documented
The state in the economy
2
Active stateLimited state
Evidence: Well documented
Personal liberty
1
Collective orderIndividual freedom
Evidence: Well documented
Nation and the world
96
InternationalistNationalist
Evidence: Well documented
Religion and the state
4
Secular stateReligion in public life
Evidence: Well documented
Power and its limits
1
Concentrated authorityChecks and pluralism
Evidence: Well documented
Crime and punishment
3
PunishmentRehabilitation
Evidence: Well documented
Dimensions left unscored, for want of evidence: Tradition and change, Environment and growth
Sources
- United Nations Human Rights Council, Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in the DPRK · 2014
- Andrei Lankov, From Stalin to Kim Il Sung: The Formation of North Korea · Rutgers University Press · 2002
Last verified: