Restoring the Nobel Peace Prize to Its Peace-Promotion Vocation |
Photograph Source: User:Piotrus – CC BY 3.0
On 27 November 1897 the multi-millionaire Swedish chemist and industrialist Alfred Nobel signed his last will and testament establishing a foundation to honour, among others “champions of peace”, those “who shall have done the most or the best work for creating the brotherhood of nations, for the abolition of reduction of standing armies, and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”[1].
Alfred Nobel was a pacifist and his goal was to encourage pacifists worldwide to work for demilitarization, disarmament, a change of paradigm. The idea was picked up by the International Peace Bureau[2], was “disarmament for development”[3].
The first recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize was the Swiss businessman Henri Dunant (1901), who founded the International Committee of the Red Cross. On his way to get a concession from Emperor Napoleon III Henri passed the battlefield of Solferino in North Italy and was horrified to see young soldiers dying and dead with no one to provide any kind of assistance. Out of this trauma he conceived the idea of banning war, and in the meantime making war less savage, hence the rules to limit the suffering of wounded and dead on the field as well as civilians rules now enshrined in the Geneva Conventions and the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, and constituting part of customary international law.
In 1905 the NPP went to the German-Austrian activist Bertha von Suttner (1843-1914), author of the famous book Die Waffen Nieder![4] Lay Down your Arms! Alas, the Nobel Peace Prize would soon be hijacked by politicians and misused to honour persons who did not qualify under Nobel’s will.
Alfred Nobel[5], who died in 1896, must have turned in his grave when the NPP was conferred not upon a peace researcher, activist or campaigner, but on a war-mongering imperialist politician guilty of countless aggressions worldwide, US President Theodore Roosevelt (1906). This set a very bad precedent, because, as we know from Nobel’s correspondence with Bertha von Suttner, the award should not be giving to politicians, but to academics and grass-roots activists engaged in rational action to ban war forever.
Perhaps Alfred Nobel’s ideas are best reflected in the 1945 UN Charter, in particular article 2(3) that commits all States parties to settle differences by peaceful means and article 2(4) that prohibits not only the use of force, but also the threat of the use of force. Alfred Nobel did not just want peace in the sense of the absence of war, but also the absence of structural violence, the positive striving for international understanding, mutual respect, and the will to cooperate in building a better world for everyone. This goal entails good faith, endeavouring to listen to others, trying to get at the root causes of problems, addressing grievances in a timely fashion, and – perhaps most importantly – refraining from artificially creating enemies, deploying the art of diplomacy, preventing strife by avoiding misunderstandings, and, above all, not provoking others by expanding military alliances that are hardly coalitions for “defence” and “collective security” but rather aggressive unions meant to coerce others by military and economic bullying.
NPP procedures
The deadline for nominating candidates for the 2026 award is 31 January 2026. Nominations should be sent by letter addressed to the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, Henrik Ibsens gate 51, 0255 Oslo, Norway. Nominations can also be submitted online or be forwarded by email to postmaster@nobel.no.
Among those with standing to submit nominations are:
Parliamentarians, members of national assemblies and national governments (cabinet members/ministers) as well as current heads of state;
Judges of the International Court of Justice and of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague;
Members of the Institut de Droit International;
University Professors, also emeriti and associate professors of history, social sciences, law,........