REPUBLIC

elements from residing in the city. In Kim’s mind, Pyongyang was for the revolutionaries, not the
reactionaries who served religion, capitalism, or the Japanese colonial government.
This practice continued after the Korean War. For Kim Il-sung, ideology was critical to rebuilding
Pyongyang, which quickly became a city of exclusion. There was no place in Pyongyang for those
who were not of the right social class or had little to offer to the regime’s political success or
image. 291 The Kim regime began politically classifying all citizens in 1958 to complete its social
revolution, a process greatly affected by the Korean War. War veterans and their families were
directly classified to a higher songbun (socio-political classification) because of their sacrifices
for the party-state. This process served as the basis for both the inclusion of the trusted and
exclusion from Pyongyang of those classified in the lower socio-political classes. Through this
process, the Kim Il-sung regime created a specific group of personnel for preferred positions and
thus residency in Pyongyang. 292
After being destroyed by American bombing during the Korean War, Pyongyang was rebuilt under
Kim Il-sung’s leadership in accordance with a strict design plan intended to recreate Pyongyang as
the “face of the nation.” 293 In May 1953, at Pyongyang’s underground theater in Moranbong, the
Pyongyang Recovery Design Conference led by Kim Il-sung drafted the Pyongyang Reconstruction
Design Plan (PRDP). The PRDP was rewritten in 1960 to focus construction in central and eastern
Pyongyang. 294 Under Kim Il-sung’s direction, apartments were built in Pyongyang at the rapid pace
of one every fourteen minutes, which was also known as “Pyongyang speed,” 295 a term favored
thereafter. 296 Labor motivation propaganda focused on this concept to encourage workers and
supervisors to build faster. 297 Since materials and personnel were in short supply, the reconstruction
of Pyongyang required the national mobilization of students and soldiers. These two groups
291 North Koreans that promote their country’s image include Olympic medal winners, particularly gold
medal winners, famous acting or musical performers, or other international competition winners.
292 Kim and Kim, Bukan sahoe-ui bulpyeongdeung gujo-wa jeongchisahoejeok hamui, 64.
293 Cho, “Bukan-ui dosibaldal yeongu,” 240.
294 Kang Song-san, Suryeongnim-gwa Pyongyang [The Supreme Leader and Pyongyang] (Pyongyang:
KWP Publishing Company, 1986), 10, as cited in Cho, “Bukan-ui dosibaldal yeongu,” 220-21.
295 “'평양 아파트', 어떻게 지었고 누가 어디 사나” [‘Pyongyang Apartments,’ How Were They Built
and Who Lives Where?], SBS News, May 29, 2014.
296 Kim Il-sung employed various “speed slogans” to motivate construction crews over the decades
to quicken construction to meet unreasonable deadlines. These slogans and their programs were “loyalty
speed” and “70-day speed battle” in 1974, “100-day speed battle” in 1971, 1978 and 1980, and “speed of the
1980s” in 1982. See Hong, “Bukan-ui apateu geonseolsijang-gwa dosijeongchi,” 38.
297 Cho, “Bukan-ui dosibaldal yeongu,” 223-28.
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Pyongyang Republic by Robert Collins