북한 공동주거의 형성요인과 변화과정 : 모더니즘, 사회주의, 통치의 도시계획의 균형과 균열

북한 공동주거의 형성 요인과 변화 과정을 도시계획 관점에서 분석했다.

It is confirmed that North Korea is the country that is physically closest but psychologically the most distant to us. This study can be said to have begun to narrow this mental distance. Based on similarities with South Korea, it is an attempt to understand the city of an unfamiliar country through communal housing, which has become a universal residence in North Korea. The majority of North Koreans, like South Koreans, live in communal housing. In particular, in the urban area of Pyongyang, 9 out of 10 people live in communal housing and 6 out of 10 people live in apartments.

It is a higher figure than Seoul, and it is possible to estimate how overwhelming the ratio of apartment and communal housing is in the urban area of Pyongyang. Therefore, North Korean communal housing is enough to be illuminated as a subject of research, but related research is lacking. Studies so far have revealed the limitations of analysis based only on the theory of socialist urban planning. In interpreting the formation and change of communal housing in North Korea, the theoretical framework was limited to socialist principles. Therefore, this study looked into communal housing in North Korea through a model combining the following three perspectives.

‘Modernism urban planning’ in the most general aspect, ‘socialist urban planning’ in the general aspect of socialist countries, although somewhat special to us, and ‘government of urban planning’ in the special situation of North Korea's three-generation hereditary dictatorship system are combined. It is an attempt at a more comprehensive interpretation of forming and change North Korean communal housing regarding the balance, imbalances and cracks of the forces of the three axes through the structured relationship of the components of each theory.

From the perspective of modernism urban planning, major cities in North Korea experienced rapid urbanization after the Korean War until the 1970s. It was confirmed that this was related to the heavy industry priority policy. In the case of Pyongyang, even now, compared to other cities, the population growth is steep. It was confirmed that this was also the result of the light industry growth policy that had been pursued since the 1970s.

In order to respond to such rapid urbanization, after the Korean War, North Korea built a standard housing type of low-rise communal housing called ‘Oirangsik (single corridor access)’ based on the model of the Soviet Union and East Germany, and supplied a large amount of housing. After that, from the 1970s, communal housing in North Korea began to become high-rise. Since the late 1980s, it has been shown to be horizontally large in terms of the length of the block, building, and the width of the central road of the apartment complex.

In this way, it can be evaluated as a natural result of modernism urban planning that the distribution of communal housing mainly in high-rise apartments in order to resolve the concentration of population due to restoration projects and industrial promotion in cities devastated after the war. Le Corbusier's style of modernism, aiming for functionally standardized housing, was the most suitable solution to the challenges demanded by North Korea in this era. This can also be seen as being in line with the development of apartments in South Korea in response to rapid urbanization since the 1970s.

From the perspective of socialist urban planning, an important characteristic of North Korea's communal housing plan is the grouping of everyday spaces to realize socialist life. North Korean communal living area was planned based on the concept of ‘Soguyeok (micro district)’, which was assumed as a spatial basic unit to organize the collective communal life of residents in socialist urban planning. Accordingly, from the late 1950s, the structure of housing + public facilities was formalized. Ideological and cultural facilities, distribution facilities, communal cooking facilities, and communal production facilities were established as public facilities.

Along with this, ‘Inminban’ and ‘Women's Union’ were organized to manage communal life. Official practices and networks have been formed and strengthened, and collectivist norms and values that residents must have, have been learned and promoted. Therefore, in North Korea under the planned economy, the physical environment of communal housing and service facilities was created, and the organizational system was established. The living space, collective practice, and the network of (re)produced relationships have repeatedly formed and developed.

From the perspective of urban planning of governance, the three regimes in North Korea have strengthened the rationality of governance by utilizing the construction of large-scale communal housing as a way to meet the immediate needs of the times. The Kim Il-sung regime put up the banner of constructing vast communal dwellings in order to restore urban functions that had been devastated by the Korean War. A large number of communal dwellings were quickly supplied through standardization of design and assembly of construction methods. This responded to the people's demand for housing and played a role in giving legitimacy to the fledgling Kim Il-sung regime.

On the other hand, the Kim Jong-il regime needed a strategy to highlight creativity and diversity, different from monotonous communal housing due to the quantitative demands of the previous period. Creating unique and new forms of communal housing and visually highlighting it became the most effective way to imprint him as a successor to the people and reveal his qualities as a ruler. It can be seen as a natural development that the Kim Jong-un regime made the declaration of a ‘civilized socialist country’ to build and enjoy world-class civilization to the people struggling with economic difficulties.

The leader's vision to turn the socialist country into a civilized country through the development of science and technol