Juche

The Juche Idea, sometimes spelled Chuch'e (chosŏn'gŭl: 주체; hanja: 主體; ), is a political thesis of Kim Il-sung which says that the Korean masses are the masters of the country's development. From the 1950s to the 1970s, Kim and other party theorists such as Hwang Jang-yop elaborated the Juche Idea into a set of principles that the government uses to justify its policy decisions. Among these are a strong military posture and reliance on Korean national resources. The name comes from juche, the Korean translation for the philosophical and Marxist term “subject”, also meaning “main body” or “mainstream”, and is sometimes translated in North Korean sources as “independent stand” or “spirit of self-reliance”. It has also been interpreted as “always putting Korean things first”. According to Kim Il-sung, the Juche Idea is based on the belief that “man is the master of everything and decides everything”.