North Korea: Migration Patterns and Prospects

The invitation to prepare a paper for The Korea Project: Planning for the Future asked me to consider migration as a functional sector in the context of Korean unification. I was specifically asked to consider “famine and distress migration” with a view to answering several questions:

• “What lessons can be learned that may be applicable to Korea?
• What are the attributes of distress migration and the necessary requirements to prevent such migration?”

In doing so, I was asked to draw on “other empirical cases and theories” and not necessarily with “specific knowledge of North Korea.”