By Choi Sung-jin
North Koreans in their 20s and 30s, who lead commercial transactions and economic activities, are emerging as a generation worthy of close observation, Pyongyang watchers here said Friday.
If the international community tightens economic sanctions on the isolationist regime as punishment for its fourth nuclear test, it will be especially worthwhile to watch how this "market generation" responds to the economic situation, the North Korea experts said.
According to North Korean defectors, the market generation, who have grown with the appearance of markets in the mid-1990s, are quite materialistic and tend to make their living by selling things at markets instead of working in offices or factories. Some do not hesitate to engage in smuggling and pay bribes to security officers when caught.
This is also the generation who use IT equipment, such as mobile phones and computers, and are quite positive in consuming foreign culture, including South Korean films and TV dramas, they said.
The National Intelligence Service, in its report to the National Assembly on July 14, also said: "The market generation is more interested in making money than ideology and is less loyal to the communist system than their parents. Their growth may serve as one factor that can change the North Korean system."
The possibility of this generation causing political upheaval that could shake the Kim Jong-un regime is small, however.
Asked how many North Koreans support Kim Jong-un, 69.2 percent of people under 35 answered "more than 50 percent," according to the Institute for Peace and Unification Studies at Seoul National University. This shows seven out of 10 in the market generation think popular support for the North Korean regime is quite strong, it said.
To the question of how long would the Kim Jong-un regime continue, only 29.3 percent said it would crumble "within a decade," compared with 46.9 percent of respondents aged 55 or older. Up to 52 percent of the market generation also supported the North's nuclear development program while only 18.2 percent opposed it.
"It is true young North Koreans are more market-oriented economically and more freewheeling socially," said Chang Yong-seok, a senior researcher at the institute. "However, they do not make efforts to get out of the rigid system and politically are even more conservative than older generations."
North Koreans in their 20s and 30s, who lead commercial transactions and economic activities, are emerging as a generation worthy of close observation, Pyongyang watchers here said Friday.
If the international community tightens economic sanctions on the isolationist regime as punishment for its fourth nuclear test, it will be especially worthwhile to watch how this "market generation" responds to the economic situation, the North Korea experts said.
According to North Korean defectors, the market generation, who have grown with the appearance of markets in the mid-1990s, are quite materialistic and tend to make their living by selling things at markets instead of working in offices or factories. Some do not hesitate to engage in smuggling and pay bribes to security officers when caught.
This is also the generation who use IT equipment, such as mobile phones and computers, and are quite positive in consuming foreign culture, including South Korean films and TV dramas, they said.
The National Intelligence Service, in its report to the National Assembly on July 14, also said: "The market generation is more interested in making money than ideology and is less loyal to the communist system than their parents. Their growth may serve as one factor that can change the North Korean system."
The possibility of this generation causing political upheaval that could shake the Kim Jong-un regime is small, however.
Asked how many North Koreans support Kim Jong-un, 69.2 percent of people under 35 answered "more than 50 percent," according to the Institute for Peace and Unification Studies at Seoul National University. This shows seven out of 10 in the market generation think popular support for the North Korean regime is quite strong, it said.
To the question of how long would the Kim Jong-un regime continue, only 29.3 percent said it would crumble "within a decade," compared with 46.9 percent of respondents aged 55 or older. Up to 52 percent of the market generation also supported the North's nuclear development program while only 18.2 percent opposed it.
"It is true young North Koreans are more market-oriented economically and more freewheeling socially," said Chang Yong-seok, a senior researcher at the institute. "However, they do not make efforts to get out of the rigid system and politically are even more conservative than older generations."
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