Transnational householding under authoritarian constraints: Kinship-based social control, migration strategies, and household reconfiguration in Kim Jong Un’s North Korea

This article examines family migration from North Korea, analyzing how migration strategies emerge from the interaction between intensified social control under Kim Jong Un and transnational householding. Drawing on interviews with 61 North Korean migrants who left between 2018 and 2020 and resettled in South Korea, it argues that households used gendered sequencing, staggered departures, and selective household reconfiguration to manage cross-border risk. These strategies were constrained by kinship-based systems of social classification and collective punishment. By centering the household, the article shows how family ties facilitate cross-border mobility while serving as a mechanism through which the state exercises control.