Communism can only survive within a closed system. Dictators maintain power by limiting information. (And yes, all communist leaders are dictators of one variety or another.) With external contact comes information. With information comes power. With power for the people comes the fall (slow or fast) of all dictatorships. Once people know there is an outside world where life is far better, they demand to participate in that better-ness, and they rid themselves of their ineffective leaders.
This is how it went in Eastern Europe. This is how it happened in Africa and Latin America. This is how communism has slowly been transitioning to capitalistic democracy in China. And this is the beginning of the end for North Korea.
Actually, this is not the first crack. Mass starvation, mass illegal immigration, and mass corruption were the first real cracks. Porous borders with China brought black market capitalism and information (in the form of cell phones and DVDs). International aid workers were a steady drip, drip, drip of outside influence.
But now, now, after these subterranean foundation shifts, we see the crack going up the wall, and it looks like the Coca-cola trademark wave.
2 comments:
Is it so strange that we often equate capitalism with good in western culture? China seems just as eager to embrace at least a socially controlled capitalism, I wonder if KFC in North Korea might have to compete with it's Confucian counterpart?
Yeah, I'm not equating capitalism with good but with information flow. Where there is freedom to do business, there is also necessarily a increased freedom of information flow. Where there is information increase, power also increases. Thus, the inbreaking of capitalism is a sign of the breakdown of communism and authoritarianism and oppression. It may take several decades, but this is a start.
And that is good.
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