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- Title
NORTH KOREA HUNGER, POLITICIZED: EXAMINING THE INFLUENCE OF INTERNATIONAL AND NORTH KOREAN POLITICAL CONSIDERATIONS ON THE EFFICACY OF NGO FAMINE RELIEF EFFORTS FROM 1995 TO THE PRESENT.
- Authors
Smrke, Brianna M.
- Abstract
Despite a large-scale international relief effort, famine conditions that emerged in the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) in the early 1990s persist to this day. Failure to sustainably resolve hunger issues stems not from the implementation of short-term humanitarian aid projects, but rather the unsuccessful outcomes of development programs, which are the domain of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). A variety of primary and secondary sources, including documents from inside the DPRK, were used to explore the DPRK famine's domestic and international political context and the extent to which these political forces affected the efficacy of development programming. This paper suggests that the reasons for NGO inefficacy cannot be separated from this political context. Domestically, the DPRK government's desire to maintain the integrity of its ideologically based system tied the causes and severity of the famine to politically-motivated actions. Internationally, donor governments used humanitarian efforts to further their DPRK-related foreign policy goals. The political considerations of aid donors and beneficiaries restricted NGOs, making them ultimately unable to address famine conditions. This review of efforts in response to the North Korean famine emphasizes the alarming ease with which political agendas can undermine the humanitarian goals of aid projects.
- Subjects
NORTH Korea; FOOD relief; NONGOVERNMENTAL organizations; PUBLIC welfare; POLITICAL accountability; DEVELOPMENTAL programs; POLITICAL agenda; HUMANITARIAN assistance
- Publication
Undercurrent, 2011, Vol 8, Issue 1, p76
- ISSN
1712-0934
- Publication type
Article