Recent Books

The Rise of Markets within a Planned Economy

Lim Soo-ho; Samsung Economic Research Institute: 296 pp., 20,000 won

The book begins with the question of why North Korea has not yet collapsed and explores the answer that marketization of the North Korean economy has played a pivotal role in propping up the regime there.

After more than 10 years of marketization, the North Korean economic system may well be described as a ``dual economic system'' in which the market mechanism and the planning mechanism coexist and influence each other.

The book explores in detail how the dual economic system operates in various economic sectors and activities in North Korea. Based on this analysis, the book also attempts to forecast future changes in the North Korea economic system; Will it go back to the classical socialist system or transit into a market economy?

The book concludes that the North Korean economic system will be transformed gradually to a market socialist system regardless of the intentions of the political authorities.

The book takes that analysis one step further by thoroughly investigating how the dual economy has affected various areas of the North Korean economy and provides a unique analysis of the mechanism through which the planned economy and the market are able to coexist and interact.

-Chung Ah-young