Women in the DPRK: Yesterday and Today

For centuries patriarchy had prevailed in Korea. Subjected to subhuman treatment in feudal society, they had to experience contempt and humiliation. They could not participate in the social life even though they had talent and abilities.

In the first half of the 20^th century, when their country was under military occupation by Japanese imperialism, their plight was more miserable. Fettered by the feudal yoke, they now became members of a ruined nation. Two hundred thousands of them were commandeered to serve the Japanese imperialist soldiers as sexual slaves in the name of “comfort women.”

Korea’s liberation (August 15, 1945) brought about a fundamental change in their fate.

Having achieved the country’s liberation through 20-year revolutionary struggle against Japanese imperialism, Kim Il Sung (1912-1994) made public the Law on Sex Equality on July 30, 1946, which stipulates that women have equal rights with men in all the political, economic and cultural realms. This put an end to the miserable fate of the Korean women.

They now became dignified masters of their country and society, enjoying equal rights with men.

In the whole period of leading the revolution and construction, Kim Il Sung maintained that women, who account 50% of the country’s population, were a driving force of the revolution that turns the other wheel of the revolution, and that a new society cannot be built if they were neglected and if their strength was not motivated. He ensured that women were enlisted in every undertaking.

In the early 1970s he set freeing them from the heavy burden of household chores as one of the three major tasks of the technical revolution in the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea). This one fact alone is enough to show how closely he was concerned with the burden women had to bear.

Chairman Kim Jong Il (1942-2011), carrying forward the President’s intention, made strenuous efforts to improve the women’s station in life.

To raise their dignity to the highest level possible and ensure that a social climate of respecting them prevail across the country, he made public many works, including Women Are a Powerful Force That Propels the Revolution and Construction and Let Us Add Lustre to the Proud Tradition of the Juche-oriented Korean Women’s Movement in the Campaign for Building a Thriving Country.

In July 2009, he visited a textile mill, congratulated the women workers there on the anniversary of the publication of the Law on Sex Equality and posed for a souvenir photograph with them.

Under the deep care of the country’s leader and thanks to the policies of the state, many women lead a dignified life as patriots, heroines and vanguards of their times. Among them are soldiers, who are defending their country with rifles in their hands, scientists, who are devoting their all to scientific research, a world marathon champion, footballers and other famous sportspersons, and women of labour feats at factories and farms. Many are working actively for the state and society as senior officials at factories and other industrial enterprises and cooperative farms and even as Deputies (MPs) to the Supreme People’s Assembly.

Their dignity and pride have now reached the highest level under the care of Kim Jong Un, supreme leader of the country.

Greeting March 8, international women’s day, Kim Jong Un ensures that various national-level functions are held every year to congratulate the women. He ensured that November 16 was instituted as Mothers’ Day, thus elevating the women’s dignity.

He inspected the Pyongyang Kim Jong Suk Textile Mill in Pyongyang, on several occasions and inquired into the living conditions of its women workers. Then he initiated building a new dormitory for them. Thanks to his meticulous care the dormitory, equipped with bedrooms, bathrooms, beauty saloon, shops, clinic and library that satisfy the workers’ needs in living and a park for relaxation, recreation and sports, was built within six months. It is now called a “workers’ hotel” and “workers’ palace.” A state banquet was arranged at the dormitory for the workers in celebration of May Day.

He once called on a woman worker, who had over fulfilled her yearly production quota every year over the previous ten years, and gave his blessing to the future of her and her husband. The ordinary worker has now become a well-known Labour Hero and a Deputy to the Supreme People’s Assembly.

The chair of the Women’s International Democratic Federation said, “In the DPRK the rights of women are being provided on the highest level. They are truly blessed women as they are leading an independent and creative life with equal rights with men and a worthwhile life as masters of the state and society.”