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For a majority of observers, the political reality of the North Korea system is today divided into two potential scenarios: reform or collapse. These two readings are the basis element of the North Korea conundrum referred to a fundamental debate on the choice of the political option confronting to such a regime: dialogue or military option. Above these two binary notations, an alternative analysis is emerging on the fact that perhaps the North Korean leadership is building the conditions of a political transition based on the liability of an economical reform. The main problem lies in the capabilities of the regime to reform itself. In the absence of an ideological aggiornamento, as China did, the North Korean regime is condemned to sink.

Marianne Péron-Doise Part-Time Lecturer at the Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales (INALCO, Paris) and at the Institut des relations internationales et stratégiques (IRIS, Paris), works on the Asian problems of safety, in particular in Korean peninsula and in Japan, like on the maritime aspects of the policies of defense of the principal Asian States.