Kim Jong-Il is Dead; Can We Hope for Something Better?

North Korea's dictator, Kim Jong-Il, died today, leaving everyone else unsure of exactly who is running the country at the moment.  Kim Jong-Il, who ruled with an iron fist over an isolated population brainwashed by an elaborate cult of personality, has left his youngest son, Kim Jong-un to succeed him.  While no one knows when exactly Kim Jong-un will take control of the country--or at the very least become a figure head for it's powerful military and propaganda engine--reports suggest that he's already been overseeing domestic affairs for some time now.  The question is this:  can South Korea, East Asia and the world expect something better in the future?
 
I'd like to think there's a glimmer of hope.  Kim Jong-un was educated abroad in Switzerland, which is neutral towards the North/South Korea conflict, at the International School of Berne (an English-language school).  This means that he has to at least have some idea of  the international community and has probably interacted plenty with many different nationalities.  Whether he's adopted an attitude and outlook on his country (and place in it) that is different from his father's remains to be seem.  Any hope I have rests mostly on the idea that he is ready to open North Korea to the world a bit, if only enough to feed the starving and destitute North Korean people whose lives and well being his father sacrificed mercilessly in favor of building nuclear weapons, fortifying his massive army, and providing disgustingly unjust luxury for himself and top elites in Pyongyang.  Perhaps Kim Jong-un has simply been biding his time until his father's death and he is open to the world to some extent.  If not, I suppose North Korea is only headed to more of the same: a starved and miserable future with a deluded population kept purposefully ignorant of the reality beyond their borders.  It's very possible, and unfortunately likely, that Kim Jong-un has been brainwashed beyond repair, in which case his father's inhumanity will live on in him.

Only time will tell.