April 01, 2023
Features

Bureaucrats, whiners, and wild horses: industrial managers in North Korean TV

Portrayal of non-party enterprise officials has become decidedly more sympathetic over the years

Among the many changes the 2000s brought to North Korean mass culture was a new type of positive character: industrial managers. This group included factory directors, chief engineers, chairpersons of collective farms, and others.

To understand the importance of this change, it is important to look back at how managers were previously represented in North Korean cinematography.