James Pearson wrote an article for The Diplomat in 2010 which sought to contradict what he saw as the widespread – yet, he argued, unjustified - notion that North Korea is a ‘failed state’, that it has not been able to provide its citizens with answers to their basic needs. For those who weren’t fully convinced by Pearson, the relatively recent Socioeconomic History of North Korea, by Daniel Schwekendiek, will offer some appeal.
The young author’s name may not be the easiest to pronounce, but his book makes for an innovative, informative and fascinating read – albeit perhaps a bit on the technical side. Schwekendiek describes a country where the political leadership has managed to survive a remarkable series of negative events, but has inevitably failed its own citizens. This failure is described from three different chapters, dedicated to social, economic and anthropometric perspectives.
James Pearson wrote an article for The Diplomat in 2010 which sought to contradict what he saw as the widespread – yet, he argued, unjustified - notion that North Korea is a ‘failed state’, that it has not been able to provide its citizens with answers to their basic needs. For those who weren’t fully convinced by Pearson, the relatively recent Socioeconomic History of North Korea, by Daniel Schwekendiek, will offer some appeal.
The young author’s name may not be the easiest to pronounce, but his book makes for an innovative, informative and fascinating read – albeit perhaps a bit on the technical side. Schwekendiek describes a country where the political leadership has managed to survive a remarkable series of negative events, but has inevitably failed its own citizens. This failure is described from three different chapters, dedicated to social, economic and anthropometric perspectives.
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Gianluca Spezza earned his PhD in 2017 from the University of Central Lancashire under the supervision of Professor Hazel Smith, on the strength of research on the cooperation between UNICEF and the DPRK in education and childcare. Dr Spezza is an assistant professor of international relations and a senior researcher at the DPRK Strategy Center at KIMEP University in Almaty, Kazakhstan; he is writing a monograph on education, international cooperation, and human capital in North Korea (Palgrave 2021). His work on the DPRK, articles or interviews, can be found, among others, on the websites of the BBC, The Guardian, The Diplomat, IRIN News, NK News, DR.dk, Newsweek Korea, and El Confidential.
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