August 17, 2021
From Ethnic Nationalism to Social Media: How North Korea Leverages Its Soft Power Abroad
While highly unlikely to attain the global success of South Korean pop culture, North Korea continues to find creative ways to soften its negative image abroad through propaganda. This raises concerns of a global disinformation campaign, as North Korean leader Kim Jong Un recently instructed the country’s propagandists to improve overseas messaging efforts, signaling a vested national interest in strengthening the country’s soft power.
North Korea is not ignorant to the financial success and global impact of South Korean pop culture. Often referred to as the Hallyu (한류/韓流) or “Korean Wave” in English, South Korea has profited tremendously from streamlining Korean dramas and pop music to a global audience, a trend that started in the late 1990s during the Asian financial crisis. According to a 2019 study by The Korea Foundation, the overseas market for the South Korean pop culture industry doubled from $5.7 billion in 2015 to $10 billion in 2019, indicating a steady increase in global consumption of South Korean media and drawing a stark comparison to the North Korean economy.
North Korea continues to find creative ways to soften its negative image abroad through propaganda
The Bank of Korea estimated North Korea’s GDP at approximately $28.7 billion (32.9 trillion Korean won) in 2019, meaning that the Hallyu’s overseas market alone generated funds equal to around 35 percent of North Korea’s GDP that year. Although this number doesn’t include revenue Pyongyang obtained from illicit sanctions evasion tactics such as cyber-enabled financial crime, it accurately depicts the disparity between the licit economies of North and South Korea. It was only a matter of time until Pyongyang began to craft its own version of Hallyu, but with a North Korean twist” the Choryu (조류/朝流). Whereas the Hal in Hallyu refers to South Korea in the South’s dialect of the Korean language, Cho in Choryu refers to Choson, the name of North Korea in its respective dialect.
Read the full article from The Diplomat.
More from CNAS
-
Indo-Pacific Security / Energy, Economics & Security
Bloomberg Surveillance | Geoffrey GertzJonathan Ferro, Lisa Abramowicz and Annmarie Hordern speak with Geoffrey Gertz, senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security about NVIDIA.Watch the full interview o...
By Geoffrey Gertz
-
Energy, Economics & Security / Technology & National Security
Sharper: Chips and Export ControlsAs competition between the United States and China has intensified, advanced technology has become the latest battlefield. After years of restricting China’s access to advance...
By Charles Horn
-
Energy, Economics & Security / Technology & National Security
Export Controls: Janet Egan, Sam Levy, and Peter Harrell on the White House's Semiconductor DecisionJanet Egan, a senior fellow with the Technology and National Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, discussed the Trump administration’s recent decision t...
By Janet Egan
-
Indo-Pacific Security / Energy, Economics & Security
Can India Survive the Trade War?India has little choice but to try to soothe simmering trade tensions with the U.S. without abandoning its redlines, while carefully managing the implications of increased coo...
By Eleanor Hume & Kyle Rutter