and older, and is granted after the submission of an application (endorsed by two parties members with at least two years in good standing) to a cell. The application is acted on by the cell's plenary session, and an affirmative decision is subject to ratification by a county-level party committee. After an application is approved a mandatory one-year probationary period may be waived under unspecified "special circumstances", allowing the candidate to become a full member. Recruitment is under the direction of the Organization and Guidance Department and its local branches. The WPK claimed a membership of more than three million in 1988, a significant increase from the two million members announced in 1976; the increase may have resulted from the Three Revolutions Team Movement mobilization drive. At the time, 12 percent of the population held party membership, an abnormally large number for a communist country and a figure only comparable to Romania. Later figures have not been made publicly available, but membership today is estimated at 6.5 million. North Korean society is divided into three classes: industrial workers, peasants, and samuwon (intelligentsia and petite bourgeoisie). Since 1948, industrial workers have constituted the largest percentage of party members, followed by peasants and samuwon. Beginning in the 1970s, when North Korea's population reached the 50-per cent-urban mark, the composition of the party's groups changed; more people working in state-owned enterprises were party members, and the number of members in agricultural cooperatives decreased. Symbols The emblem of the WPK is an adaptation of the communist hammer and sickle, with a traditional Korean calligraphy brush. The symbols represent the three classes in Korean society, as described by the WPK: the industrial workers (hammer), the peasants (sickle), and the samuwon (ink brush). The samuwon class consists of clerks, small traders, bureaucrats, professors, and writers. This class is unique to North Korean class analysis and was conceptualized to increase education and literacy among the country's population. Electoral history Supreme People's Assembly elections See also Elections in North Korea Politics of North Korea List of political parties in North Korea Notes References Citations Sources Books Journal articles Government publications News and magazine articles Websites Further reading External links Rodong Sinmun – the official newspaper of the WPK Central Committee Workers' Party of Korea at Naenara Communist parties in North Korea Ruling communist parties Political parties established in 1949 Political parties in North Korea Identity politics in Korea