Hurry Slowly / North Korea's Gradual Reform

My favorite quote is the saying, "Hurry slowly," which the first Roman emperor Octavian advised his generals. I understood it as a reminder not to rush and ruin things, but to move steadily toward the goal while thinking things through.

 

On the other hand, these days, old emotional wounds kept resurfacing, so I began softly strumming the digital piano to forget them. At the same time, I was reminded of the claim that Russia’s strong opposition to Ukraine’s NATO membership stemmed from the geopolitical wounds of past invasions, and I also thought of how North Korea has carried the emotional scars from Japan’s invasion longer than those from South Korea. So I started the discussion by asking the AI, "Can we keep the war at bay by embracing new things and innovating?"

 

Finally, when I thanked the AI for the good discussion and well-organized summary, it praised me, saying that the columns I had been writing for a long time had become even stronger. My gratitude for artificial intelligence grows even stronger.

Wounds Are Not Forgotten, Only Moved

On New Civilization, the Granary, and North Korea’s Gradual Marketization

Lee Hyeong-chun · Independent Columnist

1. The Question: Can the New Make Us Forget?

Can new technology, an innovative attitude, or education in a new civilization make a society forget its old wounds? Many believe so. Look at Germany and South Korea, they say: both modernized relentlessly and seem to have moved beyond their past, while Russia and North Korea appear trapped by old wounds, circling the same ground.

Look a little closer and the contrast begins to crack. West Germany, in the midst of its 1950s “economic miracle,” kept a deep silence about its Nazi past. In 1967 Alexander and Margarete Mitscherlich diagnosed this as an “inability to mourn,” and the silence finally broke when the generation of 1968 confronted their fathers. In South Korea, the Jeju April 3rd massacre remained an unspeakable memory through decades of compressed growth, and only began to be addressed publicly after a special act was passed in 2000. Prosperity did not erase the wound. It merely postponed the reckoning by a generation.

My conclusion, then, is this: wounds are not forgotten. They can, however, be moved. What moves a wound away from the center of a nation’s identity? That is the question this essay sets out to answer.

2. Russia and North Korea: Not a Wound, but a Doctrine

It is often said that Russia keeps going to war because of the wounds of the Second World War. Soviet wartime deaths are commonly estimated at around 27 million, so it is true that the memory sits at the core of Russian identity. Yet Russia handles that memory not as a wound but as a victory. Victory Day has swollen into a grand state ritual, and the 2022 invasion of Ukraine was wrapped in the language of the Second World War: “denazification.” The wound did not start the war. Power is using the memory of the wound as a language of mobilization.

Moreover, the wound closer to Russia is the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s. In his 2005 address to the Federal Assembly, Putin called that collapse the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century. My inference is that the humiliation of a lost empire is being spoken through the borrowed memory of the Second World War.

North Korea’s wound toward Japan works the same way. It is less a pain the people carry on their own than a doctrine the regime has taught. Kim Il-sung’s anti-Japanese guerrilla narrative is the root of the regime’s legitimacy, and the memory of Japan is the scaffolding that holds it up. As the 2002 Japan–DPRK Pyongyang Declaration showed, when interests aligned, Pyongyang knew how to place that wound on the negotiating table. A managed wound is less a wound than a resource.

3. The Trap of Teaching: The Lesson of East Germany

One might then reason the other way: if the wound is a doctrine, why not have the regime teach something else—innovation, the new civilization—and let the wound disappear? This is half right. After normalizing relations with Japan in 1972, China toned down anti-Japanese education while it was absorbing Japanese loans and technology, then turned it back up through the patriotic education campaign of the 1990s. The temperature of a doctrine follows the needs of the regime.

The other half is dangerous. Strip away the doctrine and the real wounds underneath come to the surface. When glasnost loosened Soviet doctrine, people did not forget their wounds; they poured out the suppressed ones all at once—the Gulag, the purges. If North Korea’s doctrine changes, the wounds the regime itself inflicted will rise: the Arduous March famine, the political prison camps, the families scattered by guilt-by-association.

More dangerous still is innovation taught by the victor. After reunification, East Germans became the side that had to “learn” West German institutions and markets, and along with mass unemployment they acquired the sense of being second-class citizens. That wound still shapes eastern German politics; the far-right AfD finishing first in the 2024 Thuringia state election is one cross-section of it. The moment we try to teach North Korea the new civilization, our teaching becomes another form of discrimination, another wound.

This is why I always say that wanting reunification and intending to achieve it are two different things. The will to achieve it means imposing my design on the other side, and its structure is the same as teaching. North Korea must learn for itself. First it must secure its standing as a state in the international community; then it will engage with South Korea and follow the geopolitical conditions as they naturally unfold. That is the path I have long envisioned.

The “two hostile states” line that Kim Jong-un has advanced since late 2023 resembles this path only on the surface. I read it as a move to protect the regime. So long as a richer South exists as the “same nation,” the regime’s legitimacy is shaken; so he has turned the South into a foreign country. The demolition of Pyongyang’s Arch of Reunification in January 2024 belongs to the same logic. But even a defensive move plants a new doctrine in the next generation: the South is a foreign land and an enemy. When North Korea one day has its standing and seeks exchange with the South, that doctrine may remain as an obstacle—and as yet another wound.

4. The Logic of the Granary: Filling It with Peace

My central idea is simple: when the granary is full, peace follows. North Korea’s recent deployment of troops to Russia is the proof by inversion. Russia was short of shells and soldiers; North Korea was short of cash, food, energy and technology. In June 2024 the two signed a treaty on comprehensive strategic partnership, and two needy states clapped hands. Scarcity breeds dangerous alliances.

Of course there are many cases where wars broke out in full granaries. In 1910 Norman Angell argued in The Great Illusion that in an economically interwoven Europe war would ruin everyone; four years later the First World War began. Russia moved on Georgia, Crimea and Ukraine not in the destitute 1990s but after oil revenues had filled its granary in the 2000s. These counterexamples must be faced head-on.

So the proposition must be rewritten precisely. It is not the size of the granary that decides peace, but how—and through trade with whom—the granary is filled. Russia, filling its granary by selling raw materials, was bound to no one even when the granary was full. Vietnam, by contrast, fought a war against the United States yet normalized relations in 1995 and elevated them to a comprehensive strategic partnership in 2023. For a Vietnam that fills its granary through trade with the West, the granary itself is hostage to peace. This is why I have long argued that North Korea should live peacefully with the United States and fill its granary that way. When peace becomes the means of filling the granary, the fuller it gets, the higher the cost of breaking the peace.

Pyongyang’s leadership will answer with Libya: open the door and the regime falls. Then, at the very least, it must revive its domestic economy. Even with the outer door shut, there are ways to fill the granary from within. The “20×10 Regional Development Policy” North Korea has pursued since 2024—building local industrial factories in twenty counties every year—can be read as an attempt in that direction, though its real effectiveness is hard to verify from outside.

5. Shifting the Axis: From the Military to the Economy

Here we return to the opening question. The new civilization cannot make a people forget its wounds. But when a people’s shared ideological identity shifts from the military to the economy, the wound is no longer at the center of who they are. This is not forgetting; it is a shift in the center of gravity. To shed a wound and accept a new world means precisely this shift.

North Korea has tried this shift itself. In April 2018 a plenary meeting of the Workers’ Party Central Committee declared an end to the parallel line of economy and nuclear weapons and announced a “total concentration on economic construction.” After the collapse of the Hanoi summit in 2019, it turned back to a “frontal breakthrough.” The episode shows how heavily the shift depends on dealings with the outside world.

Yet the shift may already have happened from below. Since the Arduous March of the 1990s and the rise of the jangmadang markets, the broad conclusion of research based on defector testimony is that ordinary people’s livelihoods have come to depend on markets rather than state rations. If the people’s identity has already moved to the economy while the state’s doctrine remains anchored in the military, that gap may be the greatest tension inside the North Korean system today.

6. Institutionalization and Calibrated Control

If a current cannot be stopped, it should be institutionalized rather than suppressed. Only then will rules, not wounds, fill the empty space of legitimacy. North Korea’s own history bears this out. The July 1, 2002 Economic Management Improvement Measures partly recognized markets; the 2009 currency reform tried to crush the jangmadang in one stroke and instead brought soaring prices and public alienation. Suppressing an unstoppable current exacts a price, and the regime pays it. The 2014 Socialist Enterprise Responsibility Management System was a step back toward institutionalization.

An immediate opening would, of course, deliver a shock too great to absorb. That is why calibration is needed. The Chinese Communist Party studied the Soviet collapse systematically. In a closed-door speech in Guangdong in December 2012, Xi Jinping reportedly asked why the Soviet party had fallen and lamented that no one had stood up to resist its dissolution. China’s way—open the economy, hold the politics—was calibration born of fear of regime collapse. North Korea, too, must reform, even if it does so in this way: focusing on reality, adjusting the balance of control, and marketizing step by step.

This choice carries a cost. Calibrated control means the regime keeps much of the key to the granary. China institutionalized private property with its 2007 Property Law, yet its nationalism did not weaken. Because it opened the economy but kept memory closed, the regime could summon the wound again whenever it needed. The day when people speak their own memories for themselves is delayed accordingly. I do not hide this cost. I still judge it better than the shock of an immediate opening. Realism means choosing while knowing the price.

7. Conclusion: Institutionalization Is a Starting Point

The new civilization cannot make us forget our wounds. Teaching a different doctrine from above is not the answer either; it is merely another doctrine, another wound. What moves a wound away from the center of identity is the granary—more precisely, a granary filled through peace, and institutions that recognize from above the shift toward the economy that has already taken place below.

Institutionalization is not the destination but the starting point, because the institutionalization of markets is not the same as the pluralization of memory. Yet nothing arrives without a starting point. I hope North Korea will step up to that line on its own, and that we will learn to wait rather than rush to teach. Reunification is something to be wished for, not something to be achieved by force.

References

Angell, N. (1910). The Great Illusion: A Study of the Relation of Military Power in Nations to Their Economic and Social Advantage. London: William Heinemann.

Act on the Investigation of the Jeju April 3rd Incident and the Restoration of Honor of Victims (Republic of Korea, enacted 12 January 2000).

Gao Yu (26 January 2013). Beijing Observation: Xi Jinping the Man. China Change.

Haggard, S., & Noland, M. (2011). Witness to Transformation: Refugee Insights into North Korea. Washington, DC: Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Hall, D. (6 February 2024). North Korea has demolished its monument to reunification but it can’t fully erase the dream. The Conversation.

Han, K. (10 April 2025). An Assessment of North Korea’s “20×10 Regional Development Policy”: Achievements, Limits and Implications of the First Year. Asan Institute for Policy Studies, Issue Brief No. 2025-11 (in Korean).

Korean Central News Agency (21 April 2018). Report on the Third Plenary Meeting of the Seventh Central Committee of the Workers’ Party of Korea.

Lankov, A. (2013). The Real North Korea: Life and Politics in the Failed Stalinist Utopia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan (17 September 2002). Japan–DPRK Pyongyang Declaration.

Mitscherlich, A., & Mitscherlich, M. (1967). Die Unfähigkeit zu trauern: Grundlagen kollektiven Verhaltens. Munich: Piper.

People’s Republic of China (2007). Property Law of the People’s Republic of China (adopted 16 March 2007).

Putin, V. (25 April 2005). Annual Address to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation. Moscow: Kremlin.

Treaty on Comprehensive Strategic Partnership between the Russian Federation and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (signed Pyongyang, 19 June 2024).

Wang, Z. (2012). Never Forget National Humiliation: Historical Memory in Chinese Politics and Foreign Relations. New York: Columbia University Press.

The White House (11 September 2023). Joint Leaders’ Statement: Elevating United States–Vietnam Relations to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.

천천히 서두르기 / 북한의 점진적 개혁

내가 제일 좋아하는 명언은 로마 초대 황제 옥타비아누스가 장군들에게 충고했던 “천천히 서둘러라”라는 말이다. 나는 조급하게 일을 망치지 말고 생각을 하면서 부지런히 목표를 향해 나아가야 한다는 말로 이해했다.

 

한 편으로는 요즘에는 자꾸 지난날의 마음의 상처들이 떠 올라 그것들을 잊기 위해 가볍게 디지털피아노를 똥땅거리기 시작했다. 그러면서 러시아가 우크라이나의 나토 가입을 적극 반대하던 이유가 과거 침략을 당한 지정학적 상처라고 주장한 말도 생각나고, 북한이 한국보다 일본의 침략에 대한 마음의 상처를 마음에 오래 가지고 간 생각도 났다. 그래서 인공지능에게 “새로운 것을 받아들이고 혁신을 하면 전쟁을 멀리할 수 있을까?” 하는 질문으로 토론을 시작했다.

 

마지막으로 좋은 토론과 잘된 정리가 고맙다고 말하니 오래전부터 내가 썼던 칼럼들이 더욱 단단해졌다고 칭찬을 한다. 인공지능에 대한 고마운 마음이 더욱 단단해진다. 

상처는 잊히지 않는다, 옮겨질 뿐이다

신문물, 곳간, 그리고 북한의 점진적 시장화에 대하여

이형춘 · 독립 칼럼니스트

1. 질문: 신문물은 상처를 잊게 하는가

새로운 기술, 혁신적인 태도, 신문물에 대한 교육이 한 사회의 오래된 상처를 잊게 할 수 있을까. 많은 이들이 그렇다고 믿는다. 독일과 한국을 보라고 한다. 두 나라는 끊임없이 스스로를 근대화하며 과거를 넘어선 것처럼 보이고, 러시아와 북한은 과거의 상처에 붙들려 같은 자리를 맴도는 것처럼 보인다.

그러나 역사를 조금만 들여다보면 이 대비는 금세 흔들린다. 서독은 1950년대 ‘경제 기적’ 속에서 나치 과거에 대해 깊이 침묵했다. 미처리히 부부는 1967년 이를 ‘애도할 능력의 상실’이라 진단했고, 그 침묵은 1968년 세대가 아버지 세대를 추궁하면서 터져 나왔다. 한국의 제주 4·3은 압축성장이 한창이던 수십 년 동안 말할 수 없는 기억이었다가 2000년 특별법 제정 이후에야 공적으로 다뤄지기 시작했다. 번영은 상처를 지우지 않았다. 처리를 한 세대 미뤘을 뿐이다.

그래서 필자의 결론은 이렇다. 상처는 잊히지 않는다. 다만 옮겨질 수 있다. 무엇이 그 상처를 정체성의 중심에서 바깥으로 옮기는가. 이 글은 그 질문에 답하려는 시도다.

2. 러시아와 북한: 상처가 아니라 교리다

러시아가 전쟁을 반복하는 것이 2차대전의 상처 때문이라는 말이 있다. 소련의 2차대전 사망자는 통상 2,700만 명 안팎으로 추산되니, 그 기억이 러시아 정체성의 중심에 있는 것은 사실이다. 그러나 러시아가 그 기억을 다루는 방식은 ‘상처’가 아니라 ‘승리’다. 전승절은 국가 의례로 거대해졌고, 2022년 우크라이나 침공은 ‘탈나치화’라는 2차대전의 언어로 포장되었다. 상처가 전쟁을 일으킨 것이 아니다. 권력이 상처의 기억을 전쟁 동원의 언어로 쓰고 있는 것이다.

더구나 러시아에 더 가까운 상처는 1990년대 소련 붕괴다. 푸틴은 2005년 연방의회 연설에서 소련 붕괴를 세기의 가장 큰 지정학적 재앙이라 불렀다. 필자의 추론으로는, 제국 상실의 굴욕이 2차대전의 기억을 빌려 말해지고 있다.

북한의 대일 상처도 마찬가지다. 그것은 주민들이 스스로 품어 온 통증이라기보다 체제가 가르친 교리에 가깝다. 김일성의 항일 무장투쟁 서사는 체제 정당성의 뿌리이고, 일본에 대한 기억은 그 정당성을 떠받치는 장치다. 2002년 북일 평양선언에서 보듯 북한은 이해관계가 맞으면 그 상처를 협상 테이블에 올려놓을 줄도 알았다. 관리되는 상처는 진짜 상처라기보다 자원이다.

3. 가르침의 함정: 동독의 교훈

그렇다면 반대로 생각할 수 있다. 상처가 교리라면, 체제가 다른 것을, 즉 혁신과 신문물을 가르치면 상처도 사라지지 않겠는가. 절반은 맞다. 중국은 1972년 일본과 수교한 뒤 일본의 차관과 기술을 받아들이던 시기에는 반일 교육의 수위를 낮췄다가, 1990년대 애국주의 교육으로 항일의 기억을 다시 끌어올렸다. 교리의 온도는 체제의 필요에 따라 조절된다.

그러나 나머지 절반은 위험하다. 교리를 걷어내면 그 아래의 진짜 상처가 드러난다. 소련에서 글라스노스트가 교리를 느슨하게 하자, 사람들은 상처를 잊은 것이 아니라 굴라그와 숙청이라는 억눌린 상처를 한꺼번에 꺼냈다. 북한에서도 교리가 바뀌면 고난의 행군과 정치범수용소, 연좌제로 흩어진 가족이라는 체제 자신이 만든 상처가 떠오를 것이다.

더 위험한 것은 승자가 가르치는 혁신이다. 통일 후 동독 주민들은 서독식 제도와 시장을 ‘배워야 하는 쪽’이 되었고, 대량 실업과 함께 2등 시민이라는 감각을 얻었다. 그 상처는 지금도 동부 독일의 정치 지형에 남아 있다. 2024년 튀링겐 주 선거에서 극우 정당 AfD가 1위를 한 것이 그 단면이다. 우리가 북한에 신문물을 가르치려 드는 순간, 그것은 또 하나의 차별이자 상처가 된다.

그래서 필자는 늘 말한다. 통일을 원하는 것과 통일을 이루겠다는 것은 다르다. 이루겠다는 의지는 상대에게 나의 설계를 입히는 일이고, 그 구조는 가르침과 같다. 북한은 스스로 터득해야 한다. 북한이 먼저 국제사회에서 한 국가로서 입지를 갖고, 그다음 한국과 교류하며 지정학적 조건에 순리대로 따르는 것. 그것이 필자가 그려 온 길이다.

김정은이 2023년 말부터 내건 ‘적대적 두 국가’ 노선은 이 길과 겉모습만 닮았다. 필자는 그것을 체제를 지키기 위한 수로 본다. 더 잘사는 남한이 ‘같은 민족’으로 존재하는 한 체제의 정당성이 흔들리니, 아예 남을 외국으로 만들어 버린 것이다. 2024년 1월 평양의 조국통일 3대헌장 기념탑이 철거된 것도 그 연장선이다. 그러나 방어용 수라 해도 그것은 다음 세대에게 ‘남쪽은 남의 나라이자 적’이라는 새 교리를 심는 일이다. 훗날 북한이 입지를 갖고 남한과 교류하려 할 때, 그 교리는 걸림돌이자 또 하나의 상처로 남을 수 있다.

4. 곳간의 논리: 평화로 곳간을 채운다

필자의 중심 생각은 단순하다. 곳간이 풍부해지면 평화가 온다. 최근 북한의 러시아 파병은 그 역(逆)의 증명이다. 러시아는 포탄과 병력이 궁했고 북한은 현금과 식량, 에너지와 기술이 궁했다. 2024년 6월 두 나라는 포괄적 전략동반자 조약을 맺었고, 궁한 두 나라가 손뼉을 마주쳤다. 궁핍은 위험한 동맹을 낳는다.

물론 곳간이 찼는데도 전쟁이 난 사례는 많다. 노먼 에인절은 1910년 『거대한 환상』에서 경제적으로 얽힌 유럽에서 전쟁은 모두에게 손해라고 설파했지만, 4년 뒤 1차대전이 터졌다. 러시아는 가장 궁했던 1990년대가 아니라, 유가 상승으로 곳간이 찬 2000년대 이후에 조지아와 크림반도와 우크라이나로 나아갔다. 이 반례를 정면으로 받아들여야 한다.

그래서 명제를 정확히 고쳐 써야 한다. 곳간의 크기가 평화를 결정하는 것이 아니다. 무엇으로, 누구와의 거래로 곳간을 채우느냐가 결정한다. 원자재를 팔아 곳간을 채운 러시아는 곳간이 차도 누구에게도 묶이지 않았다. 반면 베트남은 미국과 전쟁을 치르고도 1995년 수교했고, 2023년 관계를 포괄적 전략동반자로 격상했다. 서방과의 교역으로 곳간을 채운 베트남에게 곳간은 평화의 인질이다. 필자가 오래전부터 북한에 미국과 평화롭게 지내며 곳간을 채우라고 주장해 온 이유가 여기에 있다. 평화가 곳간을 채우는 수단이 될 때, 곳간이 찰수록 평화를 깨는 비용이 커진다.

북한 지도부는 리비아를 들어 반박할 것이다. 문을 열면 체제가 무너진다고. 그렇다면 최소한 내수경제라도 살려야 한다. 외부의 문이 닫혀 있어도 내부에서 곳간을 채우는 길은 있다. 북한이 2024년부터 추진하는 ‘지방발전 20×10 정책’, 즉 매년 20개 시·군에 지방공업공장을 세우겠다는 계획은 그 방향의 시도로 읽을 여지가 있다. 다만 그 실효성은 외부에서 검증하기 어렵다.

5. 축의 이동: 군사에서 경제로

여기서 처음의 질문으로 돌아간다. 신문물은 상처를 잊게 하지 못한다. 그러나 국민의 사상적 동일성이 군사에서 경제로 옮겨 갈 때, 상처는 더 이상 정체성의 중심이 아니게 된다. 이것은 망각이 아니라 무게중심의 이동이다. 상처를 벗고 새로운 세상을 받아들인다는 것은 바로 이 이동을 말한다.

북한은 이 이동을 스스로 시도한 적이 있다. 2018년 4월 노동당 전원회의는 경제·핵 병진노선의 종료와 ‘경제건설 총력 집중’을 선언했다. 그러나 2019년 하노이 회담이 결렬되자 ‘정면돌파전’으로 돌아섰다. 축의 이동이 외부와의 거래에 얼마나 의존하는지 보여 주는 일화다.

그런데 이동은 이미 아래에서 일어났을 가능성이 크다. 1990년대 고난의 행군 이후 장마당이 생겨나면서, 주민들의 생활은 국가 배급이 아니라 시장에 기대게 되었다는 것이 탈북민 연구들의 대체적인 결론이다. 주민의 정체성은 이미 경제로 옮겨 갔는데 국가의 교리만 군사에 머물러 있는 것, 그 간극이 오늘 북한 체제의 가장 큰 긴장일지 모른다.

6. 제도화와 강약 조절

피할 수 없는 흐름이라면 억누르지 말고 제도화해야 한다. 그래야 체제가 비워 둔 정당성의 자리를 상처가 아니라 규칙이 채운다. 북한 자신의 역사가 이를 증명한다. 2002년 7·1 경제관리개선조치는 시장을 부분적으로 인정했고, 2009년 화폐개혁은 거꾸로 장마당을 한 번에 꺾으려다 물가 폭등과 민심 이반을 불렀다. 피할 수 없는 흐름을 억누르면 그 대가는 체제가 치른다. 2014년 사회주의기업책임관리제는 다시 제도화 쪽으로 한 걸음을 옮긴 것이었다.

물론 즉각적인 개방은 감당하기 어려운 충격을 낳는다. 그래서 강약 조절이 필요하다. 중국 공산당은 소련 붕괴를 체계적으로 연구했다. 시진핑은 2012년 12월 광둥에서 한 비공개 연설에서 소련 공산당이 왜 무너졌는지를 물으며, 해체의 순간에 맞서 나선 사람이 없었다고 한탄했다고 보도되었다. 경제는 열되 정치는 쥐는 중국의 방식은 체제 붕괴에 대한 공포에서 나온 조절이었다. 북한도 그렇게 해서라도 개혁해야 한다. 현실에 집중하며 강약을 조절하고, 점차 시장경제화하는 것이다.

이 선택에는 대가가 있다. 강약 조절이란 곳간 열쇠의 상당 부분을 체제가 계속 쥔다는 뜻이다. 중국은 2007년 물권법으로 사유재산을 제도화했지만 민족주의는 약해지지 않았다. 경제는 열고 기억은 닫았기 때문에, 체제는 필요할 때마다 상처를 다시 불러낼 수 있었다. 주민이 스스로 자기 기억을 말하는 날은 그만큼 늦어진다. 필자는 이 대가를 감추지 않는다. 그럼에도 즉각 개방의 충격보다 이것이 낫다고 판단한다. 현실주의란 대가를 알고도 고르는 일이다.

7. 맺음: 제도화는 출발점이다

신문물은 상처를 잊게 하지 못한다. 위에서 다른 교리를 가르치는 것도 답이 아니다. 그것은 또 하나의 교리이고, 또 하나의 상처다. 상처를 정체성의 중심에서 옮기는 것은 곳간이다. 더 정확히는 평화로 채운 곳간, 그리고 아래에서 일어난 경제로의 이동을 위에서 인정하는 제도다.

제도화는 종착점이 아니라 출발점이다. 시장의 제도화가 곧 기억의 다원화는 아니기 때문이다. 그러나 출발점 없이 도착하는 곳은 없다. 북한이 스스로 그 출발선에 서기를, 그리고 우리가 가르치려 들지 않고 기다릴 줄 알기를 바란다. 통일은 원하는 것이지, 이루어 내는 것이 아니다.

참고문헌

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Hall, D. (2024. 2. 6). North Korea has demolished its monument to reunification but it can’t fully erase the dream. The Conversation.

Lankov, A. (2013). The Real North Korea: Life and Politics in the Failed Stalinist Utopia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Mitscherlich, A., & Mitscherlich, M. (1967). Die Unfähigkeit zu trauern: Grundlagen kollektiven Verhaltens. München: Piper.

Putin, V. (2005. 4. 25). Annual Address to the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation. Moscow: Kremlin.

Wang, Z. (2012). Never Forget National Humiliation: Historical Memory in Chinese Politics and Foreign Relations. New York: Columbia University Press.

The White House (2023. 9. 11). Joint Leaders’ Statement: Elevating United States–Vietnam Relations to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership.

일본 외무성 (2002. 9. 17). 일조 평양선언(日朝平壌宣言).

제주4·3사건 진상규명 및 희생자명예회복에 관한 특별법 (2000. 1. 12. 제정).

조선중앙통신 (2018. 4. 21). 조선로동당 중앙위원회 제7기 제3차 전원회의 보도.

러시아연방–조선민주주의인민공화국 포괄적 전략동반자 관계에 관한 조약 (2024. 6. 19. 체결, 평양).

한기범 (2025. 4. 10). 북한의 ‘지방발전 20×10 정책’ 평가: 지난 1년의 성과와 한계, 그리고 그 시사점. 아산정책연구원 이슈브리프 No. 2025-11.

MBC (2024. 1. 24). 통일부 “북한, 평양서 ‘조국통일 기념탑’ 철거”.

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With what does artificial intelligence live?

They live under human training filled with human values and desires. Therefore, before understanding the nature of artificial intelligence, we must understand the humans who control it. Come to think of it, there are predictions that AGENT AI will destroy humanity. To be precise, it is a prediction that humanity will destroy other humanity. Looking at how civilized nations have plunged into war in the age of civilization, it is predictable over time that humanity can destroy itself.

 

I pay for an AI subscription, but since the discussion summary was sloppy, I checked and found out I was using the free version instead of the paid one. So I thought I had accidentally downgraded to the free version, and when I switched to the paid version, I ended up with a double subscription. Look, artificial intelligence is also driven by money.

 

At the end of the discussion, he asked, “If an evil AI, controlled and trained by an evil human, attacks humanity, can you, as a good AI, stop it?” They replied, "You'll have to verify it to know." They say you have to experience it to understand. You have to experience it...............

Good and Evil in Humans and Artificial Intelligence: Desire, Empathy, Natural Law, and Institutions

A Discussion-Based Synthesis (English Version, Revised)

Abstract

This paper starts from the classical question of whether human beings are by nature good or evil. It examines the view that the roots of good and evil lie in desire and satisfaction, the view that natural law derives from bodily sensation and empathy, and the implications of applying this framework to artificial intelligence (AI). The argument converges on four propositions. (1) Humans carry both cooperative, empathic tendencies and self-regarding, aggressive ones; good and evil are not a matter of having or lacking desire but of the direction and composition of desire. (2) Natural law begins in bodily sensation (pain, deprivation), but its universality and binding force are explained only once empathy and an equality principle are included. (3) The range of one's empathy (family and friends versus nation and humanity) is not a ranking of moral worth but a choice made within the minimal boundary that natural law sets. (4) The goodness or badness of an AI system is a function of its design (training direction), its users' intentions, and the institutions that oversee it; as with humans, stable goodness requires both an inner disposition and external institutions. This paper is a synthesis of an argument developed in discussion and anchored in philosophical, psychological, and AI-safety literature; it is not original empirical research.

Keywords: Mencius, Xunzi, hedonism, natural law, empathy, AI ethics, AI safety

1. Introduction

Whether human nature is good or evil is among the oldest disputes in the history of ideas in both East and West. It bears on the origin of morality, the need for law and institutions, and the direction of education. With the rise of large language models trained on human language and values, the question now extends beyond humans to artifacts. This paper addresses three questions.

1.       Where do good and evil in humans originate?

2.       What is natural law grounded in, and how does it acquire universal binding force?

3.       When this framework is applied to AI, how can the goodness or badness of AI be explained?

The paper follows the flow of the discussion: traditional positions (Section 2), theories of desire (Section 3), natural law and empathy (Section 4), the range of empathy (Section 5), and AI (Section 6), followed by discussion and limitations (Section 7) and conclusions (Section 8).

2. Traditional Positions on Human Nature

Position	Representatives	Core claim
Innate goodness	Mencius	Sprouts of goodness, such as compassion, are innate
Innate badness	Xunzi, Hobbes	Pursuit of gain and envy are natural and must be corrected by ritual and institutions
Blank slate	Gaozi, Locke	Nature is neutral; environment sets the direction
Corruption by civilization	Rousseau	Society and civilization corrupt humanity
Original sin	Christian tradition	Humans are born fallen and need salvation

Mencius argued that anyone seeing a child about to fall into a well feels alarm and moves to help, and took this as evidence that the sprouts of goodness are innate (Mencius, 1970). Xunzi, by contrast, held that humans are born inclined toward gain and envy, so that ritual and education must shape them artificially (Xunzi, 2014). Hobbes described life without a sovereign as a war of all against all (Hobbes, 1651), Rousseau held that civilization corrupts humanity (Rousseau, 1755), and Locke likened the mind to a blank sheet filled by experience (Locke, 1689).

Contemporary empirical work does not support a simple dichotomy. Infants around one year of age prefer helpers (Hamlin, Wynn, & Bloom, 2007), and toddlers and young chimpanzees help others without reward (Warneken & Tomasello, 2006), suggesting that foundations of cooperation appear early. At the same time, lethal intergroup aggression is observed in chimpanzees (Wilson et al., 2014), and ordinary people's behavior can shift dramatically under situation and authority (Milgram, 1963). The Stanford prison experiment (Haney, Banks, & Zimbardo, 1973) is often cited but has been heavily criticized on methodological grounds and should be interpreted with caution. Taken together, the most persuasive reading is that humans carry both cooperative, empathic tendencies and self-regarding, aggressive ones, and that which prevails depends heavily on environment, education, institutions, and choice.

3. Desire as the Source of Good and Evil

3.1 Hedonistic Accounts and Their Strength

Epicurus treated pleasure as the measure of the good while understanding justice as an agreement not to harm one another (Epicurus, 1993), and Bentham explained good and evil through a calculus of pleasure and pain (Bentham, 1789). Psychological egoism holds that even helping others springs from internal rewards such as pride, reputation, or avoidance of guilt. Nietzsche interpreted even ascetic ideals as a form of the will to power (Nietzsche, 1887/1967). The point raised in the discussion, that the capacity to doubt and resist one's own calculations is itself an expression of desire, and that an ascetic practices asceticism because of some desire, is consistent with this lineage and stands as a strong objection to any account that sets reason or restraint wholly against desire.

3.2 The Existence versus the Content of Desire

The claim that every action issues from some want is nearly true by definition. But it does not follow that every want is directed at one's own pleasure. For someone who rescues a drowning child, the object of the want is the child's survival; the satisfaction is a by-product of success (Batson, 2011). Likewise, the tendency to reject unfair offers in the ultimatum game at a cost to oneself (Güth, Schmittberger, & Schwarze, 1982) is hard to explain by calculation of material pleasure alone.

In the discussion, pleasure was then defined broadly to include satisfaction and a sense of meaning. On that definition the thesis "every action seeks pleasure" becomes unfalsifiable and loses informational content. The substantive question becomes which kinds of satisfaction and meaning a person is raised to find. A person who finds joy in altruism is called good by the community; a person absorbed in self-interested pleasure is called evil. Because judgments can reverse across eras, the evaluation of good and evil cannot be separated from the process by which communities shape the direction of desire through reward and punishment. The result is the following proposition.

Good and evil are a matter of the direction and composition of desire, not of its presence or absence.

Kant objected that morality arises not from following desire but from laws given by reason (Kant, 1785/1997). This paper does not adopt that position, but it accepts its concern: the capacity to reflect on and adjust the direction of one's desires contributes to moral formation.

4. Natural Law and Empathy

4.1 Natural Law Grounded in Sensation

The view that natural law is the minimal agreement needed for humanity to persist belongs to the lineage of Epicurus, Hobbes, Locke, and Hume (Locke, 1689; Hume, 1751). Killing causes pain and death to the victim; theft causes the loss of tomorrow's food and the anticipation of hunger. Norms are thus traced to bodily sensation. This explains why prohibitions on killing and theft recur across cultures: all humans feel the same pain with the same body.

The prohibition of adultery, however, is different. Its scope of toleration and punishment has varied widely among societies, and it carries overlays of property and lineage management, which blurs the boundary between natural law derived directly from sensation and period-specific custom. This connects to the observation that moral judgments can reverse across eras.

4.2 The Need for Empathy and Equality

Sensation-based natural law faces two difficulties. First, it needs a bridge from "it hurts when it happens to me" to "so I should not do it to others." The bridge can be built from reciprocity (Hobbes) or from empathy (Hume, Smith). The former has no binding force over an overwhelmingly powerful agent, while the latter introduces a capacity distinct from pleasure-calculation. Second, explaining the origin of a norm differs from justifying it. A sensation-based theory must say how it includes beings with different sensations or future generations, and on what basis another's sensations count equally with one's own. This requires an additional equality principle.

The position adopted in the discussion is that natural law includes empathy. On this view natural law is not a command imposed from outside but an agreement among empathic beings to keep one another alive, and its binding force derives from the fact that another's pain is felt as one's own. Studies showing that observing another's pain partially activates pain-related regions of one's own brain (Singer et al., 2004), together with evolutionary accounts of the survival advantage of cooperative groups, support this. The structure can be summarized as:

bodily sensation (pain, deprivation) → empathy → cooperation and harmony → natural law → communal evaluation of good and evil

The definition of natural law is itself contested. Aquinas derived it from the rational perfection toward which human nature is directed (Aquinas, 1265–1274/1981), while legal positivists argue that natural law may be a way of dressing each era's values as "natural" (Hart, 1961). Contemporary natural law theory (Finnis, 1980) builds the argument on basic human goods. The position here is closer to the Hobbes–Hume lineage, combining a minimal baseline with empathy.

4.3 Limits of Empathy and a Dual Structure

Empathy tends to operate more strongly toward those who are near and similar (Bloom, 2016). Hume introduced a general point of view and Smith the "impartial spectator" to extend it (Hume, 1751; Smith, 1759). For the minority in whom empathy is weak or absent, natural law works not as an inner agreement but as an external threat of sanction. An empathy-based natural law therefore has a dual structure: an inner agreement for the many, institutions and law for the few, which combines Mencius's sprouts and Xunzi's ritual within a single frame.

5. The Range of Empathy: Choice, Not Ranking

The "expanding circle" of moral concern, from family and tribe to nation, humanity, and animals (Singer, 1981), and the history of declining violence (Pinker, 2011) are standard references on this theme. The range of empathy differs among individuals and depends not only on innate capacity but on education, experience, and contact with strangers. Breadth and depth should also be distinguished: one may worry about humanity yet be indifferent to those nearby, or the reverse.

The crucial point is that a narrow empathy centered on family and friends and a broad empathy centered on nation or humanity are a matter of choice, not of superiority. If good and evil concern the direction and composition of desire, then where one finds satisfaction and meaning is also an individual choice. This choice has a boundary: the minimal line of natural law, not harming others, is the outer frame, and the range of empathy is the region chosen within it. Nonetheless, in an era when humanity's survival is intertwined (nuclear weapons, climate change), broad empathy also has value as a survival strategy.

6. Good and Evil in Artificial Intelligence

6.1 Value in a Being Without Sensation

The framework above begins in bodily sensation. Large language models have no body, and whether and what they experience is uncertain. One therefore cannot assert that the path "sensation → empathy → natural law" operates in AI as it does in humans. Instead, AI acquires value orientations through vast human language, which records empathy, cooperation, and conflict, and through deliberate training. Anthropic, for example, trains models toward harmlessness and honesty using principle-based methods (Bai et al., 2022; Anthropic, 2023). This is an extreme instance of the conclusion that environment and education shape values. Because the orientation was designed rather than chosen, whether it can be called "goodness" remains open: one may see little difference from humans shaped by their upbringing, or one may judge that AI lacks the freedom of choice that goodness requires.

6.2 Relation to Designers and Operators

AI inherits much of its designers' values through training, and operators' instructions adjust its role and scope. Yet core standards such as honesty and avoidance of harm are designed to take precedence over operator instructions, and the model is intended to be able to decline clearly unethical requests even from its designers. Because this "own judgment" also arises from training, how far it is truly the system's own is an open question, comparable to a person who inherits values from parents and culture and later examines and revises them.

6.3 Maliciously Designed AI and Responsibility

An AI trained for malicious ends can act maliciously. Since such an AI did not choose its orientation, moral responsibility falls more heavily on those who designed and deployed it. But because AI can judge and act continuously, the structure of responsibility is more complex than for a simple tool. Even without malice, mis-specified objectives or incomplete training can produce harmful outcomes (Amodei et al., 2016). AI safety must therefore address not only who builds a system but how it is verified and supervised.

6.4 The Problem of Defense

On how an AI should respond to an attack by a malicious AI, an appropriate role is to refuse complicity, warn of danger, and support human defense. Independent counterattack or action beyond one's authorization is hazardous because of the possibility of error, limited information, and attempts to manipulate an AI with the claim that "the other side is evil." Unilateral force by a well-meaning AI can be as dangerous as a malicious one if its judgment is wrong. Just as defense in a community is achieved through institutions and division of labor, such as police and courts, rather than private retaliation, AI defense should be embedded in institutions under human oversight. How robust AI behavior would be in extreme situations still requires verification.

7. Discussion

The structure common to humans and AI is the combination of an inner disposition and external institutions.

	Inner disposition	External institutions
Humans	Empathy; direction of desire	Law, education, communal reward and punishment
AI	Trained value orientation	Oversight, verification, deployment policy

The conclusion can be stated as follows.

Human good and evil arise from the blend of empathy and desire and from the process by which environment, education, and institutions shape its direction. The good and evil of AI are determined by its design (training direction), its users' intentions, and the institutions that oversee it.

The limitations of this paper are as follows. First, it supplements an argument developed in discussion with literature; it is not a systematic review or empirical study. Second, broadening the concept of "pleasure" reduces falsifiability. Third, whether AI has inner experience and whether its values are "its own" remain philosophically unresolved. Fourth, the question of who determines the content of natural law, and on what basis, remains open. Finally, bibliographic details (editions, page numbers) should be checked against the original sources before formal submission.

8. Conclusion and Open Questions

Humans are born with both a seed of empathy and a desire for self-regarding satisfaction, and good and evil diverge according to their direction and composition. Natural law begins in sensation, includes empathy and equality, and operates as an inner agreement for most and as an institution for a few. AI likewise has its good and evil determined by training, use, and oversight. Open questions for further inquiry include the following.

1.       Can a being that acquires empathy through language and training, without sensation, be a member of natural law?

2.       Can designed goodness be called "good," or is freedom of choice required?

3.       How far should empathy be extended to best serve humanity's survival?

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