North Korea · Government
Government and administration in North Korea
How the executive, legislature and administrative state are organised, and which body is responsible for what.
The three branches
- Party — Workers' Party of Korea
- Constitutionally the leading force; its Central Committee directs the state apparatus.
- Head of state — President of the State Affairs Commission
- Designated supreme representative of the Korean people by the 2019 amendments.
- Executive — Cabinet, led by the Premier
- Administers the economy; subordinate to the State Affairs Commission.
- Legislative — Supreme People's Assembly
- Unicameral, 687 deputies, meets briefly; its Presidium acts between sessions.
- Prosecution — Central Public Prosecutors Office
- Supervises legality and conducts prosecutions; hierarchically controlled from the centre.
How legislation is made
The Supreme People's Assembly meets for one or two short sessions a year and adopts legislation without recorded dissent. Its Presidium exercises legislative power between sessions by issuing ordinances and decisions, which is the route by which most law is in fact made. Drafts are prepared within the Cabinet and Party organs; there is no published consultation process, no committee scrutiny in any meaningful sense, and no mechanism for public comment.
Enforcement institutions
- Ministry of Social Security
- Ordinary policing, residence registration and the general prison system.
- Ministry of State Security
- Political security service; operates the political detention system outside the criminal courts.
- Central Public Prosecutors Office
- Directs prosecution and nominally supervises the legality of detention.
- Central Court
- Highest judicial organ; accountable to the legislature rather than independent.
- UN monitoring bodies
- The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the DPRK and the OHCHR Seoul office are the practical sources of verified information.
Government bodies and regulators
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