>The U.N. is closer to what I was imagining, but regardless, what I'd like to see is a strong push for North Korea to open it's borders in exchange for a lightening of sanctions.
That wouldn't fly with them. Their entire governmental ideology is based upon something called "Juche" which means 'self reliance'. It would kinda be like asking the US to give up the first amendment in exchange for some trade goodies. Just not gonna happen.
>The NK leadership's power is retained almost entirely through keeping people in the dark.
This isn't true. People are not in the dark as much as you might think. They are vaguely aware of what goes on outside the country's borders. It would be impossible for them not to be. This is partly why a year ago the NK government released a list of "best places in the world to live". China was #1 because North Koreans are able to watch the Chinese get rich and the government couldn't deny it.
The leadership's power is predicated mostly upon two things :
A) Propaganda that makes the citizens afraid of the outside world - US and Japan mostly. Unfortunately, when the US does shit like invade Iraq, saber rattle Iran, and sticks nukes on the 38th parallel (did you not wonder why NK developed nukes? THAT'S why), it's not that hard to convince North Koreans that they are under mortal threat. The strong censorship helps a lot with this, but the propaganda would probably still hold pretty well without it.
B) A gift economy. The leader showers his underlings with maseratis. He showers his underlings with jewellery. He showers his underlings with alcohol. Etcetera. All the way down. The hierarchy is very well cemented in by strong ties of loyalty. Chop off the head and all of that remains.
>On a wackier, cantankerous note, I also envision a scheme of dropping solar-charged epaper tablets and blasting the entire country with free WiFi to make locking down knowledge about the outside world impossible.
This type of thing has been going on for a long time (hell, we've had short wave radios for how long?). It doesn't really seem to be working.
Yes, the North Koreans get this stuff sometimes, but seeing a DVD of Friends doesn't immediately inspire them to overthrow their government and the smart ones are rightfully terrified of owning such contraband.
I'd be more optimistic about this strategy, too, if propaganda didn't work so well on American citizens, who have all of those things and yet still believe absurd lies fed to them by their leaders.