No queen in waiting likely to rule North Korea’s ‘Kimdom’

SEOUL — Kim Ju-ae, the preteen daughter of all-powerful North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, is being immortalized on a set of stamps issued by the secretive state. The stamps, made public Tuesday, depict Ju-ae surrounded by military brass, with her father by her side and an intercontinental ballistic missile as a backdrop.

Couple that with unconfirmed reports last week that all other North Korean women called Ju-ae have been ordered to change their names, and rumors are flying that Ju-ae, believed to be 9 or 10, is being groomed to succeed her father, grandfather and great-grandfather as the head of the hermetic Kim dynasty.

Despite media buzz surrounding Ju-ae and her aunt — Mr. Kim’s prominent and powerful sister, Kim Yo-jong — veteran North Korea watchers caution that the chance of any woman ascending to the pinnacle of power in Pyongyang is slim.

“North Korea is a very male-dominated society,” said Choi Jin-wook, who heads the Seoul-based Center for Strategic and Cultural Studies. “They say men and women are equal, and they have been emphasizing equality since they needed labor in the 1950s, but in reality, among high-rank officials, women are very, very rare.”

“If we look at the past leadership of North Korea, there were some smart ladies working with it — but few,” said Joanne Kim, president of the Korea Heritage Education Institute. “It is male dominant, and they depend on violence and physical and military power.”

Beyond the cultural biases, it is widely believed within South Korea’s community of Pyongyangologists that Mr. Kim has a secret son. The belief is that the son — even his name is unknown, though he is thought to be a few years older than Ju-ae — is actually the likely heir to the Kim throne while being kept out of sight and danger.

Ju-ae made her public debut holding her father’s hand during a November missile test and is routinely described in the state-controlled media as Mr. Kim’s “beloved” and “respected” daughter. Her real role may be to serve as cover, deflecting attention from her brother and duping the North’s many adversaries and the global media.

No queen for the Kimdom

Korean society, both traditional and modern, has not elevated many women to positions of real power.

“The last ruling Korean queen dates back to the Silla Dynasty,” said the Korea Heritage Education Institute’s Ms. Kim.

Silla was a kingdom that fell in the 10th century, and in the succeeding dynasties that ruled the peninsula up to the 20th century, “queens were consorts — wives of kings,” Ms. Kim said. As such, they were able to exercise power only “behind the screens.”

Even in today’s democratic, cosmopolitan South Korea, the world’s 10th-largest economy, gender equality is problematic. It was ranked 99th among 146 nations in the World Economic Forum’s 2022 Gender Gap Index. Since the end of World War II, South Korea has had just one female president, Park Geun-hye. Her administration was cut short when she was impeached and removed from office four years after her election in 2013.

Matters look even grimmer in the post-communist, ultra-militarized, neo-monarchy north of the DMZ.

Bloody feuds erupted in ancient Korean palaces, and paranoia and risk stalked Pyongyang’s elite. Mr. Kim had his powerful uncle, Jang Song-thaek, executed for disloyalty in 2013 and his China-based half brother, Kim Jong-nam, assassinated in Malaysia in 2017 for reasons unknown.

Granting a successor, even a daughter, such a high profile at a young age would be high risk. “Why would Kim be putting a target on his daughter’s back?” asked a retired South Korean military source.

Hence the likelihood of a different successor: Kim’s rumored son.

“As a boy is a much more serious candidate than Ju-ae, Kim Jong-un does not want to show him,” Mr. Choi said.

Mr. Kim gained an international perspective via schooling in Switzerland. Some Pyongyang watchers believe that his son, too, may be overseas for reasons of education and discretion.

“There is a lot of speculation about why he is in the shadows, and one is that he is not in North Korea but is under diplomatic cover, perhaps in Sweden or Switzerland or in China, Hong Kong or even Moscow,” said Go Myong-hyun, a North Korea expert at Seoul’s Asan Institute for Policy Studies. “Protection may be one reason. … I think Ju-ae’s prominence is more the Kim regime is playing international media.”

With solid sourcing of the opaque North Korean regime hard to come by, yet another rumor is that the son might not be the child of Ri Sol-ju, Mr. Kim’s wife, Mr. Go said. If the rumor is true, then the exposure of infidelity would clash with Mr. Kim’s carefully scrubbed public image.

‘Normalizing’ North Korea

Though state-sponsored historical accounts give some space to the mother of dynasty founder Kim Il-sung, and subsequently on the sister of his son Kim Jong-il, neither was depicted at the center of famous events. The high public profiles of three women in Kim Jong-un’s inner circle — his wife, sister and daughter — is a marked departure from past practice.

Driving Mr. Kim may be his overseas experience and a desire to “normalize” his regime.

His father, Kim Jong-il, ruled in virtual secrecy, undercutting the power of official state bodies. Kim Jong-il had multiple paramours and fathered several children out of wedlock.

Kim Jong-un has returned a range of duties and powers to party bodies. He has granted his wife, Ms. Ri, a first-lady-type profile and has brought her on official visits to sites such as children’s hospitals.

“I think he has normalized his managerial style to the North Korean people,” Mr. Go said. “Kim Jong-il had many wives and girlfriends, so Kim Jong-un wanted to give the people a sense of stability by having an ‘official’ wife.”

Although Ms. Ri’s profile is high, she has been seen behind her daughter in recent appearances. Meanwhile, global media have been more entranced by Mr. Kim’s unusually outspoken younger sister.

Kim Yo-jong rose to prominence as an envoy to Seoul before the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea. Those diplomatic maneuvers paved the way for the 2018 Singapore summit between Mr. Kim and President Trump.

The diplomacy with Washington fizzled after a 2019 summit in Vietnam, and Kim Yo-jong transitioned to a role as the regime’s “bad cop,” unleashing frequent, well-covered tirades against Seoul and Washington in state media.

Her prominence, some say, points to Mr. Kim’s paranoia.

“Yo-jong is powerful as Kim cannot trust members of the existing establishment,” Mr. Go said, “so he has to rely on blood relatives.”

Yet blood does not overcome gender when it comes to succession. “Yo-jong can be empowered as she has little chance of succeeding him,” Mr. Go said. “She is limited in her potential, as a woman.”

Alternatively, Ju-ae’s soaring profile may be designed to eclipse her aunt’s. In the past three months, Kim Yo-jong’s visibility has plunged.

“If Yo-jong keeps doing as she has been doing, many elites will follow her, so Kim Jong-un is afraid of that,” Mr. Choi said. “This is a message to power elites: ‘Look: I have children, and Yo-jong is helping me, but don’t follow her too much.’”