INTRODUCTION
The closing time approaches. In mid-afternoon
the falling Norwegian winter darkness
is painting the windows in an increasingly
opaque blue-gray color. A regular at the
library of the Nobel Institute closes
a book in a mat
slam, another one brings back a magazine
to its place on a shelf before putting
on his parka and going out. We do not
greet each other but we do know, for
the most diligent of us, that we'll meet again here tomorrow, perhaps as early as 8 o'clock, at the opening. In a small adjoining room, I hear the
head librarian and her assistant.
Soon, after everybody is gone, they will turn off the
light and lock the heavy wooden door.
And what if, this time, I did not
leave? The idea occurred to me more than once to hide in a corner to be trapped
here. Spending a night alone in the Norwegian Nobel Institute, it is not reasonable
of course. Moreover the place is probably equipped with an alarm system. A
camera is watching you in the lobby. But still ... The committee that every
year awards the Nobel Peace Prize with the brilliance that we know holds its
meetings in the same building, upstairs. Much of the documentation which is
used to select the winners lies somewhere in the archives. A mine of
informations for historians and researchers wishing to decrypt the choice of
the committee of five Norwegian "wise persons" and better understand
how does the Nobel mechanics work.
During my first few days at the
library I inadvertently discovered that the key one asks to the staff to have
access to toilets on the ground floor of the Institute also opens the next
door. After a hallway without interest, I found myself in a much larger space
filled with bookshelves on several rows. Piles of documents are sleeping here
in the dark. Impossible of course to gauge the content at a glance. Later, back
at my working seat, I could not help but fantasize about the information
collected in this dark room. Admittedly much of them are accessible to any
researcher or journalist having duly made the request to conduct a specific
project. But how not to think to the confidential data which are packed here
away from inquisitive eye.
Because if it is transparent in its
functioning and the set of rules that govern it, the system running all the
Nobel prizes (peace, literature, medicine, physics, chemistry and – since 1969
– economics) isn’t transparent anymore the closer you get to its heart. Why the
different entities entitled to award the most prestigious award choose
particular winners rather than others, and why at those specific moments? How
important is the human factor in the decision process? Can ideological preferences,
personal enmities, relational or friendly acquaintances, distrust of principle
with respect to representatives of a particular nationality remain foreign to
many choices? Often presented as the pinnacle of literary excellence, the
ultimate scientific research, the culmination of a commitment to a great cause,
the Nobel Prize can not be objective. But that aspect, that I’ll decipher in
these pages as much as possible, is not intended to be known outside a small
circle of people involved. There is also no minutes of the proceedings taking
place within the various committees awarding the Nobel Prize.
In addition researchers and handpicked
journalists have access to confidential documents relating to each Nobel Prize
only fifty years after it was awarded. A time-stamp instituted in 1973 by the
Nobel Foundation, the guardian of the temple located in Stockholm. Half a
century is a long time. It will not be before 2062 and beyond that we will find
out who were the other potential candidates vying for the prize in 2012 and following,
who had presented them to the various bodies awarding the prize, what arguments
did they put forward in their respective choices, etc. These details will then
have lost the salt of the news and will no longer risk to be criticized, if not
perhaps by a few stubborn researchers. But let’s not complain: before 1973 there
was no question to half-open the lid on the Nobel stew. Everything was to
simmer in the greatest secrecy, and forever. A far cry from the idealized image
of a hyper-transparent and accessible Scandinavia.
From the perspective of the Nobel Foundation it is nevertheless logical
and understandable that this internal kitchen remains safe from prying
eyes for several decades. The system is partly based on the advice of ad hoc experts consulted by the institutions awarding the prize.
A too early disclosure of the reports
would be likely to damage the careers of their authors, especially in science. Such discretion has
also helped to shape the unrivaled reputation of these awards granted since 1901 (except
the one in economics imposed much later, I’ll explain why). What other rewards are awaited
with a bigger interest by book publishers and writers, by the scientific community or the political-diplomatic circles? What distinction has such a resonance in the media that it carries
often previously unknown names to the ears of the general public ? Nobel’s name itself has become
a trademark synonymous with
proven quality and sustainable eminence. Read
it backwards and you will see
another (French) word: Nobel... Lebon. Thegood to be opposed to the "evil" if we stick to the Peace prize, reflecting an often very
Western view of the distinctions, far from the initial
concerns of their founder – which is not without bothering some purists.
In short, these distinctions awarded in Sweden (except the Peace
prize, given out in Norway) are
designed to reward the cream of each
of the disciplines involved. Or
at least what is supposed to be
so. Because the choice of some
winners has not always been clairvoyant, as shown in this historical investigation. Other figures were
never rewarded when they could
have legitimately claimed to be.
The best known example is Mahatma Gandhi, absent from the list of the Nobel Peace prize laureates.
Once again, human, political and
geostrategic factors play an important role. This is particularly
the case for the committee that awards
that specific prize. Only five persons
are composing it, all citizens of Norway, a prosperous
country that stands on the
fringes of Europe in a cozy provincial atmosphere,
away from the cares of the world (except, gigantic exception,
when a native "crusader" sows
terror among his fellows in the name of a war against
multiculturalism, as was the case
on July 22, 2011).
These "wise
persons", we shall see, are
not always selected for their skills in the areas of foreign policy, history
of international relations or issues
of security and disarmament. In fact this is less and less the case. Each time they pick questionable laureates the controversy gets bigger. The latest one emerged in
the wake of the 2009 prize awarded
to President Barack Obama,
throwing the Norwegian committee
into a small crisis of legitimacy and
sparking debate about its composition.
Its independence is also questioned, particularly
by China, furious at the award to the dissident
Liu Xiaobo in 2010. Without
slipping into the Beijing leaders’ shoes one may indeed ask whether the handful of former Norwegian politicians who sit in the Nobel
committee are the best suited to award
such a world famous prize.
The Nobel
Prize in Literature as well sometimes reflects in an obvious manner the inclinations
of the members of the Swedish Academy
which gives out the award. This is the most subjective of the Nobel prizes’ galaxy, as acknowledged by the scholars I met in
Stockholm. The long list of rewarded personalities – as well as the one of
the great absents – also refers to the
mentality and the successive intellectual waves that have dominated Scandinavia, more or less in step with the rest of
Western Europe. The slow opening
towards South American, Asian, African
literatures takes place only from
the late 1960s. And what about
the place left to women by the Swedish “Immortals"? For forty-five years, between 1946 and 1991, they only find one worthy enough
to receive their prize. Again, one of the images
Scandinavia likes to reflect, that of a region at the forefront of gender equality, gets hurt.
All things considered, the
overall achievement of the Nobel institution remains extraordinary
literally speaking. This deserves, to
start with, to revisit the history up to the era of the
Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, the man who discovered
dynamite. What motivates
him, at the beginning of the
Belle Epoque, to create these awards? The reactions in Sweden and Norway to
the disclosure of Nobel’s will are
mixed, to say the least. Today these
countries do not have to regret it was
implemented, each annual prices
generating a significant and
mostly positive media coverage "between
tradition and modernity." This is true especially for the prize ceremonies
organized each year on December 10, the anniversary of Nobel's death, in the presence of the reigning royal
families. The fortune left by the scientist to reward the laureates and to fund a well-oiled machinery also stirs curiosity. How
is the money being managed, especially at
this time of economic crisis? Is the increasing use of private sponsors a risk to the prizes’ independence and to the "Nobel brand",
an expression that reflects a move
towards the commercial sphere? These
are some other questions I will discuss in the book, as well as well the sometimes very close ties
that unite the body
awarding the prize in medicine and some
pharmaceutical companies.
Finally, human
nature being what it is, an
investigation into the mechanisms and behind the scenes of
the Nobel Prizes would be incomplete
if it would not narrate the efforts of countless individuals to
get that beautiful distinction. Height of professional
success and universal consecration often synonymous with
significant monetary benefits, such rewards arouse
the lust of the most thirsty ones for recognition, honors and emoluments. Since
their launch, these prizes
have been subject to campaigns to promote candidates. Lobbying is
increasing with the prizes’ global impact. Simple courtesy visits,
gifts, use of more or less influential go-betweens, … The range of resources used is quite broad. Anyway, we are assured
in Stockholm and Oslo that the Scandinavian mindset is
incompatible with such maneuvers.
That does not mean, far from it, that the
Nobel committees were
never influenced in their decisions.
A. J.
Histoire du prix Nobel
Antoine Jacob
François Bourin Editeur, Paris, 2012, 240 pages
http://www.bourin-editeur.fr/fr/books/histoire-du-prix-nobel
http://www.bourin-editeur.fr/fr/books/histoire-du-prix-nobel
