British Ties May Have Cost Gandhi Nobel
January 31, 1998 - 0:0
OSLO Norway's loyalty to Britain after World War II may explain a 50-year-old mystery in long-secret Nobel archives why India's independence leader Mahatma Gandhi never won the peace prize. No name missing from the list of prize winners, first awarded in 1901, has caused such controversy as that of Gandhi, who led with a philosophy of passive resistance. He was assassinated by a Hindu fanatic on January 30, 1948.
Hundreds of documents in a huge basement safe at the Nobel Institute in Oslo, made available for Reuters after a 50-year secrecy rule, show that Gandhi was nominated but did not win the prize in 1937, 1947 and 1948. Historians say the five-man jury of the 1940s was pro-British and had a patronizing attitude to candidates from the developing world. The jury may also have hesitated because of fighting between India and Pakistan after independence in 1947.
The committee did not keep minutes of its meetings so we may never know the real reasons why Gandhi did not win, said Geir Lundestad, the director of the Nobel Institute. If I were to guess, one factor which made it difficult to give the prize to Gandhi was the very strong pro-British orientation in Norway's foreign policy, he told Reuters. The view of Britain as the protector of Norway was very strong, said Helge Pharo, a professor of history at Oslo University. He noted the committee included resistance leaders who had fought Norway's occupation by Hitler's Nazis from 1940-45, and others who fled to exile in Britain or the United States. The archives, including a cardboard box full of hundreds of letters nominating candidates, show Gandhi made a six-strong short-list in 1947.
That year the prize went to the Quakers Pacifist Group. To modern ears, Gandhi's name stands head and shoulders above other short-listed candidates that year including Sir Alfred Zimmern, Natanael Berskow, Edvard Benes and Eleanor Roosevelt. Other factors blocking a prize for Gandhi may have been fighting between India and Pakistan after the collapse of the British Raj. A 1947 briefing written for the committee about Gandhi notes that it was the year of his greatest victory and his greatest defeat India's independence and partition of the sub-continent.
In early 1948, the committee was bombarded with nominations for Gandhi to win the prize. The quaker organizations the American Friends Service Committee and the British-based Friends Service Council were among those nominating Gandhi. But Gandhi's assassination came two days before the February 1 deadline for nominations. No prize was awarded for 1948 and the committee issued a statement saying there was no suitable living candidate.
Under statutes at the time, the committee could have made a posthumous award, Lundestad said. The remark about no living candidate may have been a tribute to Gandhi or to Sweden's Count Bernadotte, killed by Israeli extremists in 1948 who opposed his mediation with Arabs. Nobel Prize Largely for Europeans, North Americans The Nobel Peace Prize at the time was largely for white Europeans and Americans Argentina's Foreign Minister Carlos Saavedra Lamas, the 1936 winner, had been the only non-European or north American laureate.
Only later did the prize take on a wide international scope, starting with the 1960 award to African National Congress leader Albert Lutuli of South Africa. Running through the Norwegian political elite was a very patronizing attitude to people from the third world, said Pharo. Even if you couldn't call them attitudes of racial superiority, they were still living in a white man's world.
The 1947 archives, kept locked away in a walk-in safe with a thick steel door, include hundreds of letters of nomination for a total of 20 candidates. Of those nominations just three are for Gandhi all from Indian politicians. Gandhi Greatest Exponent of Non-Violence One reads: Recommend for current year Noble (SIC) prize Mahatma Gandhi living symbol of eastern and Indian culture and philosophy greatest exponent of non-violence and international peace.
Olav Riste, a history professor at Oslo University, said it was quite plausible that ties to Britain inhibited the committee from rewarding Gandhi. He noted that Gunnar Jahn, the head of the Prize Committee at the time, was a leader of the resistance. Carl Joachim Hambro, the committee's deputy leader, had ensured that King Haakon and the government fled to Britain when the Nazis invaded in 1940.
But Hambro was no particular friend of Britain. He was advocating a kind of small state philosophy, under which all the big states were evil and only smaller ones were purveyors of sanity and morality, Riste said. (Reuter)
Hundreds of documents in a huge basement safe at the Nobel Institute in Oslo, made available for Reuters after a 50-year secrecy rule, show that Gandhi was nominated but did not win the prize in 1937, 1947 and 1948. Historians say the five-man jury of the 1940s was pro-British and had a patronizing attitude to candidates from the developing world. The jury may also have hesitated because of fighting between India and Pakistan after independence in 1947.
The committee did not keep minutes of its meetings so we may never know the real reasons why Gandhi did not win, said Geir Lundestad, the director of the Nobel Institute. If I were to guess, one factor which made it difficult to give the prize to Gandhi was the very strong pro-British orientation in Norway's foreign policy, he told Reuters. The view of Britain as the protector of Norway was very strong, said Helge Pharo, a professor of history at Oslo University. He noted the committee included resistance leaders who had fought Norway's occupation by Hitler's Nazis from 1940-45, and others who fled to exile in Britain or the United States. The archives, including a cardboard box full of hundreds of letters nominating candidates, show Gandhi made a six-strong short-list in 1947.
That year the prize went to the Quakers Pacifist Group. To modern ears, Gandhi's name stands head and shoulders above other short-listed candidates that year including Sir Alfred Zimmern, Natanael Berskow, Edvard Benes and Eleanor Roosevelt. Other factors blocking a prize for Gandhi may have been fighting between India and Pakistan after the collapse of the British Raj. A 1947 briefing written for the committee about Gandhi notes that it was the year of his greatest victory and his greatest defeat India's independence and partition of the sub-continent.
In early 1948, the committee was bombarded with nominations for Gandhi to win the prize. The quaker organizations the American Friends Service Committee and the British-based Friends Service Council were among those nominating Gandhi. But Gandhi's assassination came two days before the February 1 deadline for nominations. No prize was awarded for 1948 and the committee issued a statement saying there was no suitable living candidate.
Under statutes at the time, the committee could have made a posthumous award, Lundestad said. The remark about no living candidate may have been a tribute to Gandhi or to Sweden's Count Bernadotte, killed by Israeli extremists in 1948 who opposed his mediation with Arabs. Nobel Prize Largely for Europeans, North Americans The Nobel Peace Prize at the time was largely for white Europeans and Americans Argentina's Foreign Minister Carlos Saavedra Lamas, the 1936 winner, had been the only non-European or north American laureate.
Only later did the prize take on a wide international scope, starting with the 1960 award to African National Congress leader Albert Lutuli of South Africa. Running through the Norwegian political elite was a very patronizing attitude to people from the third world, said Pharo. Even if you couldn't call them attitudes of racial superiority, they were still living in a white man's world.
The 1947 archives, kept locked away in a walk-in safe with a thick steel door, include hundreds of letters of nomination for a total of 20 candidates. Of those nominations just three are for Gandhi all from Indian politicians. Gandhi Greatest Exponent of Non-Violence One reads: Recommend for current year Noble (SIC) prize Mahatma Gandhi living symbol of eastern and Indian culture and philosophy greatest exponent of non-violence and international peace.
Olav Riste, a history professor at Oslo University, said it was quite plausible that ties to Britain inhibited the committee from rewarding Gandhi. He noted that Gunnar Jahn, the head of the Prize Committee at the time, was a leader of the resistance. Carl Joachim Hambro, the committee's deputy leader, had ensured that King Haakon and the government fled to Britain when the Nazis invaded in 1940.
But Hambro was no particular friend of Britain. He was advocating a kind of small state philosophy, under which all the big states were evil and only smaller ones were purveyors of sanity and morality, Riste said. (Reuter)