Wikipedia Deep Dive

Nobel Peace Prize

9 min read

In 1888, a French newspaper made a spectacular mistake. Alfred Nobel's brother Ludvig had died, but the paper thought it was Alfred himself. They ran an obituary with a headline that would haunt the living brother: "The merchant of death is dead."

The article was brutal. It accused Nobel of getting rich "by finding ways to kill more people faster than ever before." Whether this obituary actually existed—some historians doubt it—the story captures something essential about why we have a Nobel Peace Prize at all. The man who invented dynamite, who transformed a Swedish ironworks into an arms manufacturer, who developed ballistite (a smokeless propellant that revolutionized warfare), spent his final years thinking about his legacy. He didn't like what he saw.

A Will That Changed History

When Nobel died in 1896, his will shocked everyone. He left the bulk of his vast fortune—earned from explosives and weapons—to establish prizes in physics, chemistry, medicine, literature, and peace. The first four made sense for a trained chemical engineer. But peace?

Nobel never explained himself.

The best theory traces back to a friendship. Bertha von Suttner was an Austrian peace activist who had briefly worked as Nobel's secretary before becoming one of the era's most influential antiwar voices. Her 1889 novel "Lay Down Your Arms" became an international sensation, and she corresponded with Nobel for years. The Norwegian Nobel Committee believes her influence was decisive.

Others see something darker and more redemptive. Nobel watched his inventions kill people. The Irish Republican Brotherhood used dynamite in terrorist attacks during the 1880s. Ballistite found its way into wars across Europe. Perhaps the peace prize was an act of atonement—a way to ensure that at least some of his money would work against the violence he had enabled.

Why Norway?

Here's a puzzle that scholars still debate: all the other Nobel Prizes are awarded in Stockholm by Swedish institutions. The Peace Prize is different. Nobel specified that a committee appointed by the Norwegian Parliament would choose the recipient, and the ceremony would take place in Norway.

In 1896, Norway and Sweden were still united under one crown, though they had separate parliaments. Why would a Swedish industrialist entrust his most idealistic prize to his smaller neighbor?

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has a theory. Sweden had a long militaristic tradition—think Vikings, think Great Power wars, think the martial glory that shaped Swedish national identity. Norway was different. By the late nineteenth century, the Norwegian parliament had become deeply involved in the International Parliamentary Union's work on peaceful conflict resolution. Norway was building a reputation as a nation of peacemakers rather than warriors.

There may also have been a practical calculation. An independent Norwegian committee would be insulated from Swedish political pressure, free to make controversial choices without embarrassing the Swedish government.

How the Prize Actually Works

Every year, a five-member committee appointed by the Norwegian Parliament selects the winner. But they don't do it alone. The process begins with nominations, and the pool of people allowed to nominate is surprisingly specific.

Members of national parliaments and governments can nominate. So can judges on international courts, professors of history, law, philosophy, and theology, directors of peace research institutes, and previous winners. That's thousands of potential nominators worldwide.

The result is a flood of names. In 2011, the committee received 241 nominations—a record at the time. But here's what most people don't understand: being "nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize" means almost nothing. Any of those thousands of eligible nominators can submit any name they choose. The committee doesn't endorse or validate nominations. They simply receive them.

This leads to some absurd situations. In 1939, a Swedish parliamentarian nominated Adolf Hitler. It was satirical—a mocking response to the serious nomination of Neville Chamberlain for his appeasement efforts at Munich—but it demonstrates how the nomination process can be gamed for publicity or protest.

The real work happens after nominations close in early February. The committee creates a shortlist. Advisers from the Norwegian Nobel Institute, including its director and research staff along with outside academic experts, spend months preparing detailed reports on the leading candidates. By mid-September, sometimes as late as early October, the committee reaches its decision.

They aim for unanimity but don't always achieve it.

The Ceremony

On December 10th each year—the anniversary of Alfred Nobel's death—the ceremony unfolds in Oslo City Hall. It's the only Nobel Prize not presented in Stockholm, a distinction that reflects both Nobel's will and Norway's unique role.

The King of Norway and the royal family attend. The laureate receives three things: a diploma, a medal, and a substantial sum of money. Around 2020, the prize was worth roughly ten million Swedish kronor, which translated to about one million American dollars. The exact amount fluctuates with the Nobel Foundation's investment returns and currency exchange rates.

The medal itself tells a story. The Norwegian sculptor Gustav Vigeland designed it in 1901, creating a distinctive profile of Alfred Nobel that differs from the version on other Nobel medals. On the reverse, three men stand in what the inscription calls a "fraternal bond," with Latin text reading "Pro pace et fraternitate gentium"—"For the peace and brotherhood of men."

The ceremony hasn't always been this grand. From 1901 to 1904, it took place in the Norwegian Parliament building. Then it moved to the Norwegian Nobel Institute until 1946, and to a university assembly hall until 1989. Oslo City Hall, with its monumental murals and waterfront location, has hosted since 1990.

The Controversies

The Oxford Dictionary of Contemporary History calls the Nobel Peace Prize "the most prestigious prize in the world." That prestige makes it a target.

Critics have attacked the prize from every angle. Some say winners are chosen for recent achievements rather than lasting contributions to peace—a kind of premature coronation that backfires when the laureate's work unravels. Others argue the prize has become nakedly political, rewarding aspiration over accomplishment, hopes over results.

The most explosive controversy came in 1973. Henry Kissinger, the American Secretary of State, and Lê Đức Thọ, the North Vietnamese negotiator, won for their work on the Paris Peace Accords that were supposed to end the Vietnam War. Two committee members resigned in protest. The press reaction was savage. Kissinger's critics saw him as an architect of war crimes, not a peacemaker. Thọ himself refused the prize—the only winner ever to voluntarily decline—saying that peace had not yet come to Vietnam.

He was right. The war continued. Saigon fell two years later.

Other controversies simmer across decades. Yasser Arafat sharing the 1994 prize with Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres for the Oslo Accords? The accords eventually collapsed. Barack Obama winning in 2009, just months into his presidency, for "extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy"? Many thought it absurdly premature. Abiy Ahmed of Ethiopia winning in 2019 for making peace with Eritrea? Within two years, he was overseeing a brutal civil war in Tigray.

The criticism cuts to the heart of what peace means. Is peace the absence of war? The presence of justice? The promotion of human rights? A successful negotiation, even if the underlying conflicts persist?

In 2011, the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten published an extensive critique. The committee, they argued, drew too heavily from retired Norwegian politicians rather than international experts. The criteria for selection remained opaque. And the committee had drifted from Nobel's original vision, which emphasized work for "fraternity between nations" and "the abolition or reduction of standing armies."

Even Nobel's own family has weighed in. Michael Nobel, grandson of Alfred's brother, accused the committee of politicizing the prize and straying from the founder's intent.

The writer Christopher Hitchens was characteristically blunt. In his memoir, he called the Nobel Peace Prize "a huge bore and a fraud."

The Great Omission

If you ask who should have won the Nobel Peace Prize but didn't, one name dominates every list: Mahatma Gandhi.

Gandhi was nominated five times—in 1937, 1938, 1939, 1947, and finally in January 1948, just days before his assassination. Each time, the committee passed him over. When he died, they declined to award a prize at all that year, saying there was "no suitable living candidate."

The omission haunts the committee. Geir Lundestad, who served as secretary of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, put it plainly in 2006: "The greatest omission in our 106-year history is undoubtedly that Mahatma Gandhi never received the Nobel Peace Prize."

Then he added something remarkable: "Gandhi could do without the Nobel Peace Prize. Whether the Nobel Committee can do without Gandhi is the question."

When the Dalai Lama won in 1989, the committee chairman acknowledged that the award was "in part a tribute to the memory of Mahatma Gandhi." It was an extraordinary admission—the prize being used, decades later, to address a wrong that could never be fully righted.

By the Numbers

As of late 2023, the Peace Prize has been awarded to 111 individuals and 27 organizations. Nineteen women have won—more than for any other Nobel Prize, which says something about who does the work of peace and something else about the biases in other fields.

Two recipients have won multiple times. The International Committee of the Red Cross holds the record with three prizes: 1917, 1944, and 1963. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has won twice: 1954 and 1981.

The most recent award, in 2025, went to María Corina Machado, a Venezuelan opposition leader, "for her tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy."

The Merchant of Death's Legacy

Alfred Nobel spent his life inventing better ways to blow things up. He made fortunes from mining explosives and military propellants. He helped turn a Swedish ironworks into an arms manufacturer.

And yet.

Every December, the world's attention turns to Oslo. A committee of five Norwegians announces who has done the most for peace. The winner receives a medal designed by a sculptor Nobel never met, money from investments Nobel never could have imagined, and a platform that shapes global conversation about war, justice, and reconciliation.

The prize remains flawed. It always will be. Peace is contested territory—every award a statement about what matters and who gets to decide. The committee makes mistakes. They reward aspiration over achievement, hope over history. They miss Gandhi and honor Kissinger.

But the prize endures because Alfred Nobel asked a question that won't go away: what does it mean to work for peace? And who gets to define it?

A man who made his fortune from death wanted to be remembered for something else. More than a century later, we're still arguing about whether he succeeded.