Posts Tagged ‘2021 Worker’s Party Congress’

The economy in the Central Committee Plenum (February 2021)

Tuesday, February 16th, 2021

By: Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

During the recent (2nd) plenary meeting of the Korean Worker’s Party Central Committee, several remarks were made that focus on the economy. Most seemed to follow the statements during the Party Congress, both in tone and focus. Emphasizing the role of legal measures seems to be a way to regularize and formalize the orders set out at the congress. Legal supervision, after all, is something continuously ongoing, unlike rule by decree. It’s unclear what “irrational elements” means in the KCNA summary, but my sense is that it may be about semi-legal and highly dubious (from the state’s point of view) practices of essentially private entities partnering with and using the bureaucratic cover of state-owned companies for business purposes.

Here’s an excerpt of the KCNA coverage from the third day, with my emphasis added in bold:

The General Secretary in his report suggested important tasks for firmly ensuring the implementation of the national economic plan by law and channeling all Party works into the fulfillment of this year’s economic tasks.

The report stressed the importance to strengthen the legal supervision and control over the establishment and executive process of the national economic plan, the order of the Party and the law of the state.

It called upon the legislation sector to remove irrational elements becoming stumbling blocks to the implementation of the national economic plan and enact and perfect new laws for every sector which help promote the efficiency of the production and construction.

It said that legislative bodies including the prosecution organ should increase their role to make sure the national economic plan is properly distributed and correctly executed, and in particular, stage a strong legal struggle for checking all kinds of illegal practices revealed in economic activities, adding that all sectors and units should obey them unconditionally.

Analyzing that the faults revealed in the economic work in the last period are caused by the party organizations which failed to fulfill their responsibilities and role as organizers and standard-bearers in carrying out the Party’s policies, the report proposed tasks of the party organizations for intensifying the party guidance and political guidance from the standpoint of holding full responsibility for the result from the implementation of this year’s economic task.

It referred to the ways for the party organizations at all levels to positively play the role in properly steering the implementation of the national economic plan while giving priority to the organizational and political work for arousing the masses to the accomplishment of this year’s goal.

It also suggested tasks calling upon the party organizations of ministries and national institutions to properly grasp and guide the execution of Party’s economic policy by enhancing the level of the Party work in line with the characteristics of their units in charge of important portion in the overall work of the state and to strengthen the direction of the party life of public service personnel.

Concluding his report on the first agenda item made through three consecutive days, the General Secretary said that the plenary meeting was convened in the timely and necessary period in the sense that it helped rectify mistakes from the stage of planning this year’s work and newly decided on the great work for the people and also helped find out and correct the ideological maladies including passivism and self-protectionism latent in officials.

(Source: “Third-day Sitting of 2nd Plenary Meeting of 8th WPK Central Committee Held,” Korean Central News Agency February 11th, 2021.)

Here is an excerpt of the second-day coverage, again with emphasis added in bold. The bottom paragraph restates much of the language from congress a few weeks ago about increasing state control:

Saying that propping up agriculture is an important state affair that must be successful at any cost to solve the food problem for the people and successfully push ahead with the socialist construction, the General Secretary analyzed the achievements and experience gained in the agricultural field for the recent several years and set forth tasks of stably and steadily developing the agricultural production based on them.

Emphasized in the report were the issues of taking prompt state measures for supplying farming materials on which success or failure of farming for this year hinges for the present, pushing ahead with the work of providing a material and technical foundation for the agricultural production in a planned way and bringing about a decisive improvement in the Party work in the rural areas.

[…]

The General Secretary in the report evinced the militant tasks to be carried out by the People’s Army and the munitions industry this year for implementing the decisions set forth by the 8th Party Congress, and the direction of future action to be taken by the sector in charge of affairs with south Korea and the sector in charge of external affairs, before underscoring the need to thoroughly carry them out without fail.

The report noted that the success or failure in this year’s economic work depends on the capability and role of the state economic guidance organs in the main, and made clear the issue that the Cabinet and state economic guidance organs should restore the function peculiar to them as economic organizer and their controlling function to improve the guidance and management over the whole economy, the one of improving the role of non-permanent economic development committee and other important practical issues for consolidating the Cabinet-centered system, Cabinet-responsibility system.

(Source: “Second-day Sitting of 2nd Plenary Meeting of 8th WPK Central Committee Held,” Korean Central News Agency, February 10th, 2021.)

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8th Korean Worker’s Party Congress and the economy: Day 1

Wednesday, January 6th, 2021

By: Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein

The Party congress in Pyongyang opened yesterday, Tuesday January 5th, and we already have some rather brief reports from KCNA. First, some relevant snippets from Kim Jong-un’s review of the Central Committee’s work:

He said that he is going to suggest through the report the key line of struggle and strategic and tactical policies for the epochal advance of the socialist construction and other important issues arising in accomplishing the cause of national reunification, promoting external relations and strengthening the work of the Party after strictly reviewing the work of the 7th Central Committee in the aspects of success and mistake.

The Supreme Leader reviewed the shining successes achieved by our Party and people in the period under review.

He also analyzed the mistakes manifested in the efforts for implementing the 5-year strategy for national economic development and their subjective and objective factors.

Underlining the need to start the work for further developing the overall economy of the country under a new five-year plan, the Supreme Leader analyzed the present states of the key industrial sectors including metal, chemical, electricity, coal, machine and mining industries and set forth the tasks for future development.

(Source: “Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un Starts Report on Work of 7th Central Committee of WPK,” Korean Central News Agency, January 6, 2020.)

As I’ve argued elsewhere, there is relatively little that the state  can do under current conditions to advance any “key industrial sectors”, aside from changes in management structures and extolling people to work harder and better — measures that will only have a marginal impact, if any.

Kim Jong-un also opened the congress with a speech, a few snippets related to the economy below:

However, though the period of implementing the Five-Year Strategy for the National Economic Development ended last year, almost all sectors fell a long way short of the set objectives.

Still existing are the various external and internal challenges that hamper and hinder our efforts and advance for fresh and continuous victories in socialist construction.

The key to breaking through the existing manifold difficulties with utmost certainty and speed lies in consolidating our own strength, our internal force, in all respects.

Proceeding from the principle of finding the cause of mistakes not in the objective conditions, but in the subjective conditions, and resolving all problems by enhancing the role of our motive force, the current congress is going to make a comprehensive and profound analysis and judgement of the experiences, lessons and mistakes we have made during the period under review and, on this basis, define the scientific goals and tasks of struggle, which we can and must accomplish without fail.

The successes we have already achieved are priceless for us, and so are the bitter lessons that have been accumulated.

All these are things that cannot be bartered even for gold, and constitute valuable assets for achieving fresh victories in the future.

We should further promote and expand the victories and successes we have gained at the cost of sweat and blood, and prevent the painful lessons from being repeated.

In particular, we should be bold enough to recognize the mistakes which, if left unaddressed, will grow into bigger obstacles and stumbling blocks, and take resolute measures against their repetition.

This congress has been convened on the basis of this pluck and commitment.

If the Eighth Party Congress, a congress for struggle, carries out its work in a substantial manner and puts forth a correct line and strategic and tactical policies, the Korean revolution will greet an era of a new leap forward and upswing.

[…]

First, it conducted the work of making a comprehensive, three-dimensional and detailed analysis and review of how the decisions of the Seventh Party Congress were implemented and drawing experiences and lessons for future progress and development.

To this end, the Party Central Committee formed a non-permanent central inspection committee and sent it to lower units on a mission to learn about the actual situations there and carefully listen to the opinions of workers, farmers and intellectuals who are Party members and work in the field.

The non-permanent central inspection committee conducted the work in the way of dispatching its teams to provinces and, after grasping the actual situations there, dispatching them to ministries and central institutions by direction and sector to make brisk, comprehensive and detailed inspections.

The teams thoroughly examined all aspects of the actual situation including what was wrong, what was neglected among what could be carried out and what was implemented in a profitable way or formalistic way in executing the decisions of the Seventh Party Congress, and if there were shortcomings, what were their causes and what were the defects in Party guidance.

During the days when the Party congress was prepared, departments of the Party Central Committee and other Party organizations across the country submitted to the Political Bureau of the Party Central Committee and the preparatory committee of the congress reports of their work over the last five years and innovative and detailed opinions on the goals and plans of struggle in the future.

(Source: “Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un Makes Opening Speech at 8th WPK Congress,” Korean Central News Agency, January 6, 2020.)

The speech contained relatively few specific and details, and we can probably expect more to come tomorrow. It seems to me that much of this, too, is a repetition of the theme we’ve seen throughout the past year: blaming officials through the chain of command for economic failures. The measure of sending out inspection teams is also consistent with the trend of striving to strengthen government oversight of the economy and, not least, uncover previously hidden financial assets.

Another angle to consider on what it means when Kim says the last plan “failed”: One of its key tenets, according to claims of leaked documents published by Japanese media, was to decrease the country’s trade reliance on China. If anything, given sanctions and the general international environment North Korea has faced over the past five years, that problem has gotten even worse.

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