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North Korea Local Government
There are three levels of local government: province
(do) (see Glossary)
and special province-level
municipalities
(chikalsi,
or jikhalsi) (see Glossary);
ordinary cities (si), urban districts
(kuyk), and counties (gun, or kun); and
traditional villages (ri, or ni). Towns and
townships (myn) no longer functioned as administrative
units in North Korea after the Korean War, but still exist in
South Korea. At the village level, administrative and economic
matters are the responsibility of the chairman of the cooperative
farm management committee in each village.
As of mid-1993, there were nine provinces: Changang, North
Hamgyng, and South Hamgyng, North Hwanghae and South Hwanghae,
Kangwn, North P'yngan and South P'yngan, and Yanggang; three
special provincial-level cities: Kaesng, Namp'o, and P'yongyang,
municipalities under central authority; seventeen ordinary cities
under provincial authority; thirty-six urban districts; over 200
counties; and some 4,000 villages
(see
fig. 9). Among these
divisions, the counties serve as the intermediate administrative
link between provincial authorities and the grass-roots-level
village organizations. Local organs at the county level provide
other forms of guidance to such basic units as blocks and
workers' districts (nodongja-ku).
Three types of local organs elect local officials to carry
out centrally planned policies and programs: KWP local
committees, local people's assemblies, and local administrative
committees (such as local administration, economic guidance, and
rural economic committees). These committees are local extensions
of the three higher bodies at the national level: the Supreme
People's Assembly, the Central People's Committee, and the State
Administration Council.
The local people's assemblies, established at all
administrative levels, perform the same symbolic functions as the
SPA. They provide a façade of popular support and involvement and
serve as a vehicle through which loyal and meritorious local
inhabitants are given visible recognition as deputies to the
assemblies. The assemblies meet once or twice a year for only a
few days at each session. Their duties are to approve the plan
for local economic development and the local budget; to elect the
officers of other local bodies, including the judges and people's
assessors of the courts within their jurisdictions; and to review
the decisions and directives issued by local organs at their
corresponding and lower levels. The local people's assemblies
have no standing committees. Between regular sessions, their
duties are performed by the local people's committees, whose
members are elected by assemblies at corresponding levels and are
responsible both to the assemblies and to the local people's
committees at higher levels.
The officers and members of the people's committees are
influential locally as party functionaries and as senior
administrative cadres. These committees can convene the people's
assemblies; prepare for the election of deputies to the local
assemblies; implement the decisions of the assemblies at the
corresponding level and those of the people's committees at
higher levels; and control and supervise the work of
administrative bodies, enterprises, and social and cooperative
organizations in their respective jurisdictions.
The day-to-day affairs of local communities are handled by
the local administrative committees. The chairman, vice chairmen,
secretary, and members of these bodies are elected by the local
people's committees at the corresponding levels.
Data as of June 1993
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