left-right divide

[unpakwon]

Would you please explain the following in bold more easily?

More remarkable has been the extent to which academics, think-tank analysts and other Pyongyang watchers have neglected to study the worldview of the military-first regime. Regardless of their own political leanings (and North Korean studies remains marked by a sharp left-right divide), they have tended toward interpretations of the country in which ideology plays next to no role.

Thank you.

[Route21]

Hi unpakwon

Perhaps this Wikipedia page on the Left-right (Socialism/Communism vs Capitalism) paradigm might help.

Left right paradigm - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Best regards
R21

[unpakwon]

Thank you for the help.

Could I rewrite it like "North Korea is studied mainly in terms of whether it is extreme socialist country or not"?

[Route21]

Hi unpakwon

I think what you are trying to say is that you believe most people study North Korea from a "Western" viewpoint of it being an extreme communist regime rather than as a dictatorship where, you say, ideology plays next to no role.

Best regards
R21

[Tdol]

I think that the sharp left-right divide means that commentators mostly come from the ends of the political spectrum more than the centre, but they nevertheless tend not to analyse the views and beliefs of the regime.
And I think that in the English-language media, this is probably the case- there's a lot of talk about events when they occur, and attempts to analyse the leader, and increasingly his heir, but little about their worldview beyond references to Juche and Stalinism.

North Korea is studied mainly in terms of whether it is extreme socialist country or not

I'd say that it means the opposite- you have think tanks and academics from the right and left who are not discussing the ideology, and the writer is trying to draw attention to this gap.