Making a Case for Economic Engagement with the DPRK
For more than fifteen years IGCC Director Susan Shirk has been visiting the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) to involve it in IGCC’s Track II security forum, the Northeast Asia Cooperation Dialogue (NEACD). Meetings on on the DPRK economy and prospects for international economic cooperation held in conjunction with NEACD sessions led IGCC and partners at the Asia Society and the Stanley Foundation to explore the potential of exchanges and training to to expose North Korean economic officials to the outside world and modern economic ideas. The objectives of such exchanges include:
- Increasing understanding in the DPRK of the U.S. economic system
- Improving knowledge of modern economic and management concepts and methods
- Stimulating critical thinking about the DPRK economic system and how to improve it
- Enhancing American understanding of the DPRK economy
In the late 1990s, the DPRK’s interest in market economies began to expand, demonstrated, in part, by an increasing number of North Korean economic experts sent abroad for study. Since then, a number of different programs have taken place in the United States and Europe, providing opportunities to exchange ideas and build economics capacity in North Korea.
A joint IGCC – Asia Society task force report, North Korea Inside Out: The Case for Economic Engagement, analyzed the DPRK’s previous attempts at market reform and explained why non-governmental economic engagement with the DPRK was in U.S. security interests.
In 2007, the United States hosted an official delegation from the DPRK that included representatives from the Ministry of Finance, the Foreign Trade Bank, Daseong Bank, and the Foreign Ministry. In addition to meeting with Treasury Department officials to discuss U.S. perspectives on issues related to integration in the international financial system, the delegation also attended a Track II event to discuss political barriers, as well as substantive barriers (such as inadequate finance and data systems) to North Korea’s entry into the global financial system and membership in international financial institutions.
In 2010, a delegation led by Shirk visited the DPRK at the invitation of of its Ministry of Foreign Affairs to learn about the DPRK economy by meeting with economic officials and visiting economic units and to explore DPRK interest in economic engagement with American universities and nongovernmental organizations.
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