Overcoming US-North Korean Enmity: Lessons from an Eclectic IR Approach

Abstract

Periods of mutual enmity in US-North Korean relations are typically interrupted by more conciliatory gestures. How can the many twists and turns in this relationship be explaiṇṇned and hopefully overcome so that more long-lasting détente is accomplished? Drawing eclectically on realism and constructivism, we conclude that a nuclear deal should address not only North Korea’s interests in security and regime survival, but also its status concerns. Applying the same theories to the other part of the dyad–the US–we conclude that it may now have material interests in ameliorating the relationship, but that such a development requires US foreign policy discourse to cease depicting North Korea as “irrational” and “evil”.