In Illicit: North Korea’s Evolving Operations to Earn Hard Curre­­ncy, Sheena Chestnut Greitens provides a detailed and thoroughly researched account of the role of illicit activities in the North Korean economy. A central conclusion of Chestnut Greitens’ analysis is that in the context of eroding state control over the licit aspects of the economy, illicit activities are also being “privatized” by North Korea’s elite.  As HRNK Co-chair and former USAID Administrator Andrew Natsios puts it, Chestnut Greitens’ report provides “evidence that a market economy is developing in North Korea, in this case a criminal one that is feeding off the suffering and deprivation of the population. The report is about the absence of the rule of law on a grand scale in North Korea and in a way that criminal activity is now being privatized.  It is very useful in understanding the perverse transformation of the country going on right now.”