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From bored intern to global fame: The Swedish peace campaigner changing the world

In the 21st century, humanity is threatened by climate change and pandemic disease. But nor has the often overlooked issue of nuclear weapons gone away, while disinformation spread via social media is creating new crises.

From bored intern to global fame: The Swedish peace campaigner changing the world
Beatrice Fihn, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize. Photo: ICAN

Here, Beatrice Fihn, Executive Director of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), tells The Local of her fears on both the nuclear threat – and the potential for social media to undermine democracy in a way that “a big radioactive bomb” simply cannot counter. Plus, Annelie Drakman, historian of ideas at Stockholm University, tells us how social media is influencing the impact of the Nobel Prize.

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The power to build a progressive world

When Beatrice Fihn started an internship during her time studying International Relations at Stockholm University, she was disappointed to learn it would focus on nuclear weapons. “I thought it was super-boring at first,” she admits.

“I thought ‘Really? Do they still exist?’ It seemed like an old, Cold War problem. I cared about the climate, human rights, women’s rights, and I thought it was separate from that.” 

She could never have imagined that less than a decade later in 2017, she’d be accepting the Nobel Peace Prize for her work with the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). But that’s exactly what happened. 

The internship, at the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom in Geneva, allowed her to see the world in a new light – and set her on a path she continues to pursue with dedication today.

“When I started working on the issue, I realised it was a real, massive existential threat that we’ve forgotten to deal with,” Fihn recalls. “It’s a fundamental part of the power structures in the world.” 

She has been ICAN’s Executive Director since 2013, working to mobilise civil society through the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Four years after ICAN’s award, how does she view the Nobel Prize’s role in addressing the world’s big challenges?

Fihn praises the “aspiration to look at people and organisations who make a real contribution to taking the world forward”. A Nobel Prize can strengthen “fragile” progress being made on global issues through the use of international law, multilateralism and diplomacy, she says. Fihn sees this as particularly vital today amid concern that resurgent nationalism could derail co-operation on climate change, infectious diseases, and nuclear weapons.

“The consequences of these things are not going to stop at borders, so it really is everyone’s responsibility,” Fihn states. “We have to figure out a way to shape the behaviour of the powerful and constrain them.” 

She praises the ability of the Norwegian Nobel Committee (which awards the Peace Prize) to “pick up on trends” and “lend a platform to actors who try to fight negative trends”.

Many people were puzzled when the European Union won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2012, Fihn says. “Fast-forward a few years, and the UK is leaving the EU and there’s tension between European countries and nationalistic tendencies,” she adds. 

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Beatrice Fihn (right) receiving the Nobel Peace Prize. Photo credit: ICAN/Jo Straube

The future of the Nobel Prizes

All of this, along with the information overload we all face, makes the Nobel Prize more relevant than ever, she believes. “Today anyone can publish anything,” she says. “I think there’s still a need for something that looks deeper into the issues and isn’t about who gets the most clicks and engagement on social media. 

“The issue of nuclear weapons is very under-reported in the media. The Nobel Prize has that potential to lift up things that might have been missed otherwise. Not everything has to be in a Tweet format.” 

Indeed, while she herself didn’t appreciate the importance of the nuclear issue in her younger years, she now warns: “If we’re going to have them forever, they’re going to be used. Yet Russia today can destablise the US with some Facebook accounts. That’s the future of warfare we’re seeing, manipulating opinions and destabilising our trust in democracy and institutions. A big radioactive bomb isn’t fighting that.”

So what progress is ICAN, a coalition of non-governmental organisations in over 100 countries, making? There are now 86 signatories to the treaty and 56 countries that have ratified it.

“We’ve utilised the Nobel Prize to build a stronger movement against nuclear weapons,” she says. “Of course, a Nobel Peace Prize isn’t going to convince Putin or Trump or Kim Jong-Un to get rid of their nuclear weapons. But we’re working with the treaty to remove their status and make this shameful, like chemical or biological weapons. Without the strong movement we now have, we would be in a much more dangerous situation.”

A history of controversy

When Alfred Nobel’s will was opened and read following his death in 1896, it was soon at the centre of international controversy. His family actually opposed the establishment of the Nobel Prize, while those he wanted to award the prizes refused to do exactly as he had requested. The first Nobel Prizes were only awarded in 1901.

So while Alfred Nobel’s legacy cannot be doubted, the prizes that bear his name have always been subject to interpretation and evolution, says Annelie Drakman, a historian of ideas at Stockholm University’s Department of Culture and Aesthetics

“When Alfred Nobel was writing his will, the common structure would be for a national academy itself to instigate a prize like this,” she says. “The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences and the French Academy already had awards. What made this unique was its international character, the huge amount of money and also the diversity of the categories – bridging between areas that hadn’t been brought together before, such as literature and medicine, for instance.”

One important element of his will that was disregarded was Nobel’s desire to reward work done only in the preceding year. According to Drakman, it appears that he intended to “give money to promising scientists who did good things in the past year”. 

She adds: “It would be a very different prize if you gave it on the basis of potential rather than accomplishment. Peter Higgs [known for the so-called ‘God particle’] was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics almost 50 years after his theory.” 

Drakman believes the decision to often award “people who had had illustrious careers” late in their lives is justified. But the prizes still reflect the values of a particular society at a particular time, she says. “There have been instances of things awarded that we don’t agree with today, like the Nobel Prize in Physiology given for introducing lobotomy in 1949,” says Drakman. “Whatever is awarded reflects the problems that society wants to solve.”

Annelie Drakman. Photo credit: Erika Gerdemark.

Unprecedented interest – and impact

“The Nobel Prizes have been around for 120 years and they managed to award most of the big names of the 20th century, with some omissions like Gandhi,” continues Drakman. 

But looking at the distinct challenges of the early 21st century, how is the Nobel Prize faring now? “The scale of its impact is unprecedented – it has never been bigger than now because of the breakthrough of social media,” she says. “The Nobel Prizes have such global visibility compared to similar prizes that lack its name recognition, so it can really reach into all corners of the world.”

She says the websites that promote knowledge of the awards get more visits from China and India than anywhere else. “Universities also use Nobel Prize awards as a metric to compare their own excellence and success against other universities,” she says. “So too do countries.”

Does all this mean that Alfred Nobel’s vision will continue to be honoured with awards that can help us tackle humanity’s most vital challenges? Can the Nobel Prize really help us save the world? “It could, of course,” says Drakman. “It’s going to help shape the direction that human activity takes within these fields. With the Nobel Prize comes a lot of attention and support.” 

And as Beatrice Fihn and ICAN can tell you, such attention and support builds momentum for change.

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IN PICS: What happened at Sweden’s 2022 Nobel banquet?

The social event of the year was back on Saturday night after two years of pandemic absence. Here's what you need to know about the dishes, the guests, the glitz and the gossip.

IN PICS: What happened at Sweden's 2022 Nobel banquet?

Who came? 

After two years off, this year’s banquet, held as usual at Stockholm City Hall, is an even bigger event than normal with the winners of three years’ worth of Nobel prizes all invited to attend, together with the great and good of Swedish society.

The Swedish royal family were, as usual, prominent, with Sweden’s King Carl XVI Gustaf, Queen Silvia, Crown Princess Victoria and Prince Daniel, Prince Carl Phillip and Princess Sofia, all seated next to the most honoured guests. Princess Madeleine and her husband Chris O’Neill did not come this year.

Crown Princess Victoria was seated between Sweden’s own Nobel Prize winner, Svante Pääbo, who won this year’s medicine prize, and Alain Aspect, who won this year’s physics prize. 

READ ALSO: The dinner that proves that Sweden is anything but lagom

Svante Pääbo and Crown Princess Victoria chat at the Nobel Prize dinner. Photo: Pontus Lindahl/TT

Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson was seated next to Emmanuelle Charpentier, who won the chemistry prize in 2020. 

Emanuelle Charpentier, the 2020 Nobel prize winner in chemistry, was seated next to Sweden’s prime minister Ulf Kristersson. Photo: Pontus Lundahl/ TT
 
King Carl XVI Gustaf was seated next to Professor Evi Heldin, the wife of Carl-Henrik Heldin, the head of the Nobel Foundation. 
 
Professor Evi Heldin and King Carl XVI Gustaf. Photo: Pontus Lindahl/TT

Christian Democrat leader Ebba Busch, known for her fashion sense, arrived in a lacy dress which got considerable attention on social media, although the Expressen newspaper rated the dresses worn by Crown Princess Victoria, and even Social Democrat leader Magdalena Andersson more highly. 

Christian Democrat leader and energy and business minister Ebba Busch. Photo: Jonas Ekströmer/TT

With the banquet coinciding with the World Cup match between England and France, UK ambassador Judith Gough and French ambassador Etienne de Gonneville, who were seated next to one another, engaged in some light-hearted banter on Twitter. 

What was for dinner? 

This year’s Nobel banquet chef Jimmi Eriksson prepared a sumptuous feast which was served by no fewer than 190 serving personnel, of which 45 were devoted to serving drinks in glasses worth 900 kronor each.

Starter

Photo: Dan Lepp/Nobel Prizes

The starter was zander (a type of fish) baked with seaweed, served together with tomatoes filled with a version of the popular pickled fish dish gravadlax made with zander instead of salmon. This was served with swede. 

The main course 

Swedish deer stuffed with morel mushrooms and sage, served with golden beet, artichoke hearts and a thyme emulsion, with a potato terrine and a gravy flavoured with star anise. 

Photo: Dan Lepp/Nobel Prizes
The potato terrine. Photo: Dan Lepp/Nobel Prizes

Dessert 

Baked cheesecake with plum compote flavoured with aniseed, plum cream, meringue, oat crisp and ginger sorbet.

What’s the schedule? 

4pm – 5.30pm: prizes are awarded in the concert hall

7pm – 11.30pm: the Nobel banquet 

What were the details the Swedish media picked up on? 

Andreas Norlén, the speaker of Sweden’s parliament, was at one point left with no one to talk to, as the two people seated next to him, literature prize winner Annie Ernaux and Princess Sofia, were engaged in intense conversations with their other neighbour. 

Green Party leader Märta Stenevi and Centre Party leader Annie Lööf both made a point of wearing second-hand ball gowns. 

 
 
 
 
 
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A post shared by Märta Stenevi (@marta_stenevi)

The Nobel Foundation’s decision to continue its tradition of not inviting the leader of the Sweden Democrat party, Jimmie Åkesson, generated commentary on Twitter throughout the evening. 

After the banquet, came the dance. 

Attendees dance after the Nobel banquet. Photo: Pontus Lundahl/TT
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