Reports of unusual activity have been emerging from North Korea. Farmers were told in early July that, going forward, the state would take not their entire harvest but only 70 percent, and they would be allowed to keep the rest. The military's economic role was partially curtailed last month when some military-managed companies were transferred to civilian control.
Meanwhile, the nation's young hereditary dictator attended a concert of American pop music — something unthinkable until recently, as the Western mass culture was, for decades, officially considered an embodiment of decay and immorality.
All these actions reflect a dramatic shift from the policies of Kim Jong Il, the longtime dictator who died in December. It appears that Kim's young heir, Kim Jong Un, hopes to transform his destitute country into a "developmental dictatorship," more or less similar to present-day China, where a market economy coexists with an authoritarian political system.