Portraits of Peace: Nobel Peace Prize Laureates
Our media channels are flooded with news of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As an antidote, librarian Sharon Teng turns to the bookshelves to reassure herself that the world is still a peaceful one.
The world saw a glimmer of hope at the beginning of 2022 as it began to emerge from a two-year pandemic that had upended lives and devastated the global economy. On 24 February 2022, hopes for a return to life in the new “normal” were dashed with shocking news of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Soon after, images of missiles raining down on Donbas, Kyiv and other regions in Ukraine and the destruction that ensued flooded the media. Instead of doomscrolling, I decided to read up on the Nobel Peace Prize. I wanted to remind myself that there have been laudable and enduring efforts from individuals and organisations over the past century to champion peace and justice rather than to wage war and inflict suffering due to a nation’s territorial ambitions.
The Nobel Peace Prize was established by Alfred Nobel (21 October 1833–10 December 1896), a Swedish chemist, engineer, inventor, entrepreneur and businessman. In his will, Nobel bequeathed the major portion of his estate to establish a fund, with the interest to be apportioned in five parts, with “one part to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”.¹
Since 1901, a total of 102 peace prizes have been awarded to 137 laureates for peace negotiations, human rights achievements and humanitarian work. Of these, just 18 have been awarded to women.²
I feel that the relatively few women amidst a sea of male winners warrant special attention, and you can find out more about them in Judith Stiehm’s excellent Champions for Peace: Women Winners of the Nobel Peace Prize.
Here are some Nobel Peace Prize winners whom I found inspiring for their courage and conviction in circumventing their traditional gender roles to stand out as champions for the disenfranchised within long-established patriarchal societies:
In 1905, Baroness Bertha von Suttner became the first woman to be awarded the Peace Prize for her contributions to the international peace movement.
Born in 1843, Baroness von Suttner, nee Countess Kinsky von Chinic und Tettau, wrote an anti-war novel Lay Down Your Arms (1889) that has been described as one of the most influential books of its time.
She became the Honorary President of the Permanent International Peace Bureau in Berne, Switzerland and she established the Austrian Peace Society in 1891. She was also a friend of Nobel and is said to have influenced him to establish a peace prize though his will.
I am struck by how she had stood out as a liberal and forceful leader at the male-dominated peace congresses in the late 19th century, earning her the sobriquet as “generalissimo of the peace movement”.³
Born in 1947, Shirin Ebadi, became one of Iran’s first female judges. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003 for her work in advocating for human rights and democracy and in particular, her activism to restore and uphold the rights of women and children.
After the fall of the shah of Iran in 1979, she lost her job. Undaunted, she eventually opened her own practice in 1992.
Despite being imprisoned for criticising her country’s hierocracy in 2000, she continued the fight for human rights undaunted.⁴ This fearlessness in the pursuit of justice is awe-inspiring and something I can only hope to aspire towards.
Malala Yousafzai, from Pakistan, is the youngest recipient ever in the history of the Nobel Peace Prize. For her efforts in advocating for the education for girls while under the Taliban regime, Malala was awarded Pakistan’s first National Youth Peace Prize (later renamed the National Malala Peace Prize) in 2011 when she was just 14.
This is of course an incredible achievement in itself: we often take education for granted in Singapore and overlook that access to education for all is not often guaranteed in other places around the world.
On 9 October 2012, Malala, along with two others, was shot by the Taliban while riding home on a school bus. She made a successful recovery and continued championing for girls’ education. At only 17, Malala was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2014.⁵ Check out Malala’s powerful story: I Am Malala: How One Girl Stood Up for Education and Changed the World.
Also included on my bookshelf of Nobel Prize winners and their inspiring stories are books about Martin Luther King, Jr (15 January 1929–4 April 1968) and the 14th Dalai Lama (Tenzin Gyatso).
From Civil Rights to Human Rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Struggle for Economic Justice sheds light on the intellectual leanings and experiences that shaped King’s ideology of non-violent protest and paints a multifaceted portrait of this great orator who pursued his dream of a world in which “all of God’s children will have food and clothing and material well-being for their bodies, culture and education for their minds, and freedom for their spirits”.⁶ Martin Luther King, Jr. was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964.
The Dalai Lama: An Extraordinary Life offers an up-close and personal study of the Dalai Lama’s remarkable achievements in uniting a quarter of a million people from different geographical locations, tribes and sects, his accomplishments as a Vajrayana Buddhist scholar and the political reforms he helped to establish. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989 for his non-violent means to protect the rights and interests of the Tibetan people.
An interesting title that I’ve come across is Gandhi and the Nobel Peace Prize. Did you know that despite being nominated five times (1937, 1938, 1939, 1947 and 1948), one of the most iconic symbols of non-violence in the world, Mahandas Karamchand Gandi (2 October 1869–30 January 1948), was never awarded the Nobel Peace Prize? In this title, the nomination letters, newspaper cuttings, reports from experts of the Committee and unpublished archival materials from the Archives of the Peace Prize Institute are closely scrutinised to explain why the Nobel Peace Prize had eluded Gandhi. Although the Committee considered awarding the prize posthumously the Nobel Peace Prize was ultimately not awarded to any recipient in 1948.
To find out how the Norwegian Nobel Committee selects the winners for the Nobel Peace Prize, read up on Behind the scenes of the Nobel Peace Prize or check out Facts on the Nobel Peace Prize for some Nobel Peace Prize trivia.
[1] ”Alfred Nobel’s will,” The Nobel Prize, accessed 9 June 2022. https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred-nobel/alfred-nobels-will/; ”Alfred Nobel’s patents”, The Novel Prize, accessed 9 June 2022, https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred-nobel/list-of-alfred-nobels-patents/; ”Alfred Nobel’s life,” The Nobel Prize, accessed 9 June 2022, https://www.nobelprize.org/alfred-nobel/biographical-information/
[2] ”All Nobel Peace Prizes,” The Nobel Prize, accessed 9 June 2022, https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/lists/all-nobel-peace-prizes/ ”The Nobel Peace Prize,” The Nobel Prize, accessed 9 June 2022, https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/
[3] “Bertha von Suttner Facts,” The Nobel Prize, accessed 13 July 2022. https://nobelprize.org/prizes/peace/1905/suttner/facts/
[4] “Shirin Ebadi Facts,” The Nobel Peace Prize, accessed 13 July 2022. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/2003/ebadi/facts
[5] “Malala Yousafzai Facts,“ The Nobel Peace Prize, accessed 13 July 2022. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/2014/yousafzai/facts/; Judith Hicks Stiehm, Champions for Peace: Women Winners of the Nobel Peace Prize. (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2018), 255–7. (Call no. 303.66 STI)
[6] Thomas F. Jackson, From Civil rights to human rights: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the struggle for economic justice. (Philadelphia, Pa.: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007), 2 (Call no. 323.1196073092 JAC)
