Politics, Politics.

[nirinia]

Going off on a political tangent, now, because I feel I need to. Feel free to ignore.

I was surprised by the choice of Obama as winner of The Nobel Peace Prize, but I think I see the reasoning. Or parts of it, at least my thoughts seem to concur with Jagland's (committee leader). It is not so much a reward for what he has done, but an incentive to keep going. A pat on the back, a looming presence to make sure he does not have second thoughts. The Committee is thrilled to see him taking the UN seriously, promising dialogue and
More of a responsibility to make a change, than a reward.

At least it's anything but Al Gore all over again.

Oh, fun fact, because I can't resist: Jagland, current Chairman of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee, is also Secretary-General of the Council of Europe. A position the Norwegian Labour Party supported his candidacy for only because they were desperate to get rid of him. They figured getting him out of their hair was worth a few million. He cannot get his foot out of his mouth. Incompetent fool, really.

Comments

[rawthorne.livejournal.com]

The thing I find troublesome, though, is that by that reasoning countless other political leaders would be deserving of the award. Anytime someone vaguely progressive comes to a position of leadership, we should reward their promises with a pat on the back in the shape of the Nobel Peace Prize - otherwise, this is just reaffirming America's primacy as center of the universe.

The prize, once awarded, is not binding in any way. Obama can turn around and go to war with Iran, thereby invalidating everything that the Nobel was awarded to him for, and they would have no way to justify their decision except to say oh, when we did it, we didn't think he'd do that but we couldn't wait to see so we jumped the gun.

I can't shake the feeling that he's been given an award for doing his job better than the previous president.

[nirinia.livejournal.com]

There I agree, but there will always be another deserving nominee. No, it is not binding. But nothing else is, either. He can choose to return to unilateralism, and choose to fight Iran. Awarding him the prize is a way of saying that we approve of growing multilateralism.

And I feel that the reasoning behind it is in keeping with Nobel's testament, roughly paraphrased: the prize should be awarded someone working for peace. Not necessarily someone who can point at his incredible results.

It is in part for doing his job a lot better than Bush, I think. He would never have been elected if not for Bush's poor job.

There, late and badly phrased answer. About to dive back into political science, my lecturer would've given this post an F XD