{"id":54699,"date":"2015-03-09T12:00:28","date_gmt":"2015-03-09T12:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=54699"},"modified":"2015-05-05T21:26:00","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T20:26:00","slug":"nobel-peace-prize-watch-launched","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2015\/03\/nobel-peace-prize-watch-launched\/","title":{"rendered":"Nobel Peace Prize Watch Launched"},"content":{"rendered":"

On March 3, 2015 The Telegraph<\/em> and a few other major news surces broke the quite extraordinary story<\/a> that the chairman of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee \u2013 the body that decides who is awarded the Prize \u2013 former Norwegian PM Thorbjoern Jagland had been demoted; it\u2019s the first time it has ever happened.<\/p>\n

It was during his chairmanship the will of Alfred Nobel was ignored most systematically \u2013 e.g. by awarding the world\u2019s allegedly most prestigious prize to President Obama, the EU and Chinese human rights (but pro-war) Liu Xiaobo.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s about 7 years ago that a small group of Scandinavian scholars decided to investigate how this prize is managed. The basic research can be found in a book by Norwegian lawyer and author, Fredrik S. Heffermehl<\/a>, The Nobel Peace Prize: What Nobel Really Wanted<\/a> which was the first major result of the group\u2019s work. It documents how this prize is \u201cprestigious\u201d only for those who either a) have never read Alfred Nobe\u2019s will; b) don\u2019t believe it should be interpreted with respect for his motives and goals and c) have very little knowledge about peace and peace research.<\/p>\n

Nobel\u2019s formulation in his will<\/a> is short and clear \u2013 the Peace Prize shall go \u201cto the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.\u201d He calls such people \u201cchampions of peace\u201d. More here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Thus, the Nobel Peace Prize is not<\/em> a do-good prize, not<\/em> a human rights or environmental prize and not<\/em> a pro-war prize. But it is<\/em> a reward work for disarmament, anti-militarism and the abolition of warfare and people \u2013 be it politicians, scholars, activists \u2013 who are pro-peace, champions of peace. The legal challenges that the Nobel Peace Prize Watch has raised over the years can be found here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Nobel Peace Prize Watch <\/strong><\/p>\n

Over the years, the criticism of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee\u2019s work has increased. Seven years ago, I cannot remember that any journalist who interviewed me about the Prize had read the will. Now about 75% of them seem to have before they call.<\/p>\n

Fredrik Heffermehl, Oslo, and Tomas Magnusson, Gothenburg, have now established the Lay Down Your Arms Association<\/a> which was incorporated and registered in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2014 with a Scandinavian and an International Advisory Board. The Association\u2019s first project has been to set up the Nobel Peace Prize Watch<\/a> where you can acquaint yourself with the Prize, its history, background, the criticism over time, etc.<\/p>\n

The Nobel Peace Prize Watch has written a detailed letter<\/a>, dated February 20, 2015, to the Norwegian Parliament, The Nobel Foundation in Stockholm and to the Norwegian Nobel Committee outlining what must be done and why a watch has become necessary. These initiatives have, with few exceptions, been ignored by the media, media which profess to practise freedom of expression and freedom of the media but seem to hesitate to challenge the political establishment that preserves this prize as an emblem for Norway and its security and foreign policy.<\/p>\n

Why? Few seem to be aware that the Nobel Committee, in constrast to other Nobel prize selection bodies, consists of former MPs and not of experts in the broad field of peace. It is worth also mentioning that Nobel in his will stipulated that the Norwegian Parliament should appoint a qualified committe; he did not say it should consist<\/em> of its members. These circumstances place the \u201cprestigious\u201d Prize in danger of being tied to Norwegian political interests.<\/p>\n

Whether this danger is big or small can be debated but not the fact that it is peculiar that the Peace Prize is the only one that doesn\u2019t require any particular scientific or other competence \u2013 as if peace was not an area of knowledge, research and professionalism.<\/p>\n

Breaking the secrecy<\/strong><\/p>\n

An global research effort has been made to break the secrecy surrounding the selection process for the Prize and publish a list of known candidates for 2015 with documentation. Transparency makes it possible for everyone to see for themselves which candidates satisfy Alfred Nobel\u2019s criteria, which candidates are selected by the Commitee and whether or not some were available who do satisfy the criteria.<\/p>\n

Allegedly there are around 300 for 2015 and here is the result of the research \u2013 a list of the so far 25 known, documented candidates.*<\/a>. You can read about each candidate, see who nominated them and with what motivations. And if you know about nominations not mentioned here, please alert the Nobel Peace Prize Watch.<\/p>\n

The work, begun 7 years ago, to create debate about the Nobel Peace Prize has gained momentum. It is unacceptable that the millions of people around the world who work for peace in the sense Alfred Nobel intended have been deprived of what is truly the most prestigious and noble thing: to be rewarded for their struggle against militarism and for a world with much fewer weapons and wars. That work will be intensified and continue to develop a critical mass in support of Alfred Nobel\u2019s will. I kindly urge you to spread this message through traditional media, social media and your various communities.<\/p>\n

Contacts for media and others:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Tomas Magnusson
\nPhone + 46 70 829 3197
\ngosta.tomas@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Fredrik S. Heffermehl
\n+47 917 44 783
\nfredpax@online.no<\/a><\/p>\n

____________________________________<\/p>\n

TFF Director Prof. Jan Oberg is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment.<\/em><\/p>\n

Fredrik S. Heffermehl, cand. jur, LLM NYU, is a member of the TRANSCEND Network and ex-Vice President of the International Peace Bureau. He is the author of <\/em>The Nobel Peace Prize, What Nobel Really Wanted (Praeger, 2010 – expanded versions in Chinese, Swedish, Finnish,\u00a0Spanish and [2014] Russian). fredpax@online.no<\/a> – http:\/\/www.nobelwill.org<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 transnational.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On March 3, 2015 major news sources broke the quite extraordinary story that the chairman of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee had been demoted; it\u2019s the first time it has ever happened. The \u2018Lay Down Your Arms Association\u2019 was incorporated and registered in Sweden and set up the Nobel Peace Prize Watch where you can acquaint yourself with the Prize, its history, background, the criticism over time, etc.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[105],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54699","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nobel-laureates"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=54699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54699\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=54699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=54699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=54699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}