Sisyphus the North Korea Watcher

Is every North Korea Watcher pushing a cursed boulder up a hill for eternity?

Every North Korea Watcher sooner or later questions what they do.

There’s the relentless routine of reading write-ups on North Korea, scanning academic dribble for insight, and dissecting the latest KCNA image. They see highly respected and feted North Korea Watchers rehashing the same crap year after year, and they know that their own ideas will never be heard beyond two graduate students and a dyslexic professor who ended up in the wrong room at an academic conference. Then, they see governments follow the same feckless policies that failed the first time, the second time, and more than likely this time too. This inevitably gives way to deeper existential questions.

The situation prompts a quiet rebellion: Why am I doing this? What is the purpose of North Korea Watching?

North Korea Watching is an absurd phenomenon! Luckily enough, philosophy provides some answers to the absurdism of North Korea watching - and there is no better corollary to North Korea watching than the tale of Sis…