North Korean Post-1945 Philosophy
In the republican period, post-1945, Marxism-Leninism in the north was built on the Confucian yangban scholar-warriors of earlier times, if perhaps taken to absolutist extremes.
The main influence in North Korea has been since 1996, the notion of "The Red Banner Spirit". This system of belief encourages the North Korean people to build a "kangsong taeguk", a fortress state, based on self-reliance and absolute loyalty to the leader (suryong). This philosophy was created by the "three generals of Mt. Paektu," referring to former North Korean leader Kim Jong-il, his father Kim Il-sung and his natural mother Kim Jong-suk. Again little is known of philosophical publications on this subject; but it appears to have replaced Marxism with a home-grown nationalistic ideology.
Read more about this topic: Korean Philosophy
Famous quotes containing the words north and/or philosophy:
“The North will at least preserve your flesh for you; Northerners are pale for good and all. There’s very little difference between a dead Swede and a young man who’s had a bad night. But the Colonial is full of maggots the day after he gets off the boat.”
—Louis-Ferdinand Céline (1894–1961)
“Mr. Alcott seems to have sat down for the winter. He has got Plato and other books to read. He is as large-featured and hospitable to traveling thoughts and thinkers as ever; but with the same Connecticut philosophy as ever, mingled with what is better. If he would only stand upright and toe the line!—though he were to put off several degrees of largeness, and put on a considerable degree of littleness. After all, I think we must call him particularly your man.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)