Introduction

As suggested by Kotef (2015, pp 13–14), we should think of politics as movement, as collective action to subvert the status quo and turn the seemingly impossible into reality:

When faced with a regime like the DPRK, such optimism seems vital. Having examined North Korean women’s stories of human rights violations in Chapter 3, in this chapter I focus on their activism. These activists’ narratives suggest that their harrowing experiences during their escapes and subsequent lives in China initially made them feel ashamed, especially as women, and therefore they managed their pain and trauma in silence. However, for each of them there had been a transitional phase, from victimhood to activism, although the extent of their involvement in activism could vary, contingent upon various factors. As demonstrated by Thalhammer (2001), individuals’ participation in human rights activism is heterogeneous, depending on variegated circumstances, such as whether they have been directly affected by the regime’s violence.

Such heterogeneity can also be found among my participants, deriving not only from the extent of their engagement but also from whether they have clearly articulable ideas and plans for the future. This is also influenced by their educational level and intellectual ability, alongside their commitment and dedication. By the same token, individuals’ participation in political activism is shaped by their education, occupation and income, which are interrelated with their gender and ethnicity (Norris, 2009). Similarly, some researchers have observed that a high educational level is an important contributing factor to becoming an activist (Ducan, 1999; Hall, 2019). However, this is not always the case for North Korean defectors’ activism. The educational levels of North Korean activists in the UK vary from those who are highly educated to those who have received middle- to high-school level qualifications.