Address, World Affairs Council, Anchorage, may 19, 2006.
KEYNOTE ADDRESS BY CONSUL KIM NESSELQUIST
“NORWAY 1905-2005. FROM RECIPIENT TO CONTRIBUTOR”


Dear President Allingham, Consul Zahl Meyer, members and guests,

Good afternoon -
And thank you for the opportunity to be here with you. I am also here to celebrate Norway’s Constitution Day – which was on the 17 of May - with the Norwegian American community tomorrow.

I am certainly honoured to get to address the World Affairs Council while I am here in Anchorage. Alaska and Norway have at least 4 things that in common – oil, fish, a long coast line and winter. We could talk a lot about that.

But today I will share with you the development of Norway - a small country up north in Europe that last year celebrated its Centennial as an independent nation, and that from 1905 until today have gone from recipient to contributor on the international arena.

It is a story of how a small nation can become an important figure in international issues if you believe in something, and more importantly, participate with your beliefs.

When Norway entered the 20th century it was one of the poorest countries in the world. Due to the economic situation, large groups of Norwegians emigrated to the US. And many found their homes here in Alaska. During the period 1850-1920 one third of Norway’s population, or about 800 000 people did leave for economic reasons.

At the turn of the century we were a part of Sweden - with a growing desire to become a fully independent nation. About 90 years earlier, at the end of the Napoleonic wars, Norway was handed over from Denmark to Sweden as war “bounty”. In this little window in 1814 – in hope of independence, and before the Swedish soldiers had returned from Europe – the Norwegian Constitution was written and adapted on May 17th l814 – in large based on the American constitution.

When the Swedish army was back in Sweden the hope of independence dwindled fast, due to Norway’s lack of military power. Norway was forced to enter into a union with Sweden – but the groundwork for independence was in place. We had our constitution.

As we entered the year 1905, Norway realized that its success in its bid to become an independent nation depended on our relations with the major players in European politics. Not without support and guarantees from the outside world could Norway expect its little revolutionary experiment to become sustainable.

This process was followed with great interest here in the United States, but most Americans at the time could not understand that Norway elected to become a kingdom and not a republic – tossing one king out only to choose another. But this time it was our own – and Norway got a voice of its own.

The simple reality was that this was necessary in order to get the support from the powers of Europe – mostly all kingdoms at the time.

The story of Norway from 1905 till today is the story of a country once in dire need of support, both politically and economically, that became a major donor to the developing world and an active player in world politics, raising from insignificant surroundings through hard work and the luck of striking oil in the 70s to become one of the world’s most prosperous nations.

Norway’s development through the last century and its position on the world arena today were unimaginable to the politicians of 1905. International support had been necessary to secure Norway’s independence, but after that the idea was to hide away up north. It is told that Norway’s first minister of foreign affairs, Jørgen Løvland, stated that Norway’s foreign policy was to have no foreign policy. Norway aimed at staying out of the world arena.

With that statement you may agree with me that the Foreign Minister was not too worried about his own job security.

The illusion of being able to live in neutral isolation was brutally crushed with Nazi-Germany’s occupation of Norway, April 9, 1940.

The policy of neutrality that the pre-WWII government had tried to lead had failed. Whether we liked it or not, we were a part of the world, and we had to look for allies to defend our interests.

WWII had affected the whole world. In the aftermath the world had to cooperate to avoid another similar disaster. The UN was seen as the solution.

Norway proudly provided the organization’s first secretary general, former foreign minister, Trygve Lie. This is the highest position any Norwegian ever has had in the UN. But Norway has never had so many representatives in high offices in the UN as today.

Jan Egeland is Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator. Terje Roed Larsen carries the same title as Under Secretary General, and is the top aide to Kofi Annan on the question of foreign troops in Lebanon. Ambassador Tom Vraalsen is in charge of the implementation of the peace agreement in Sudan – just to name three.

In Europe, Nazism was defeated, in a big way thanks to the efforts and sacrifice of the United States. However, the Communist Soviet Union’s occupation of large portions of Central and Eastern Europe was clear enough evidence for Norwegians to join NATO.

We could not hide away, and we had to develop a strategy for participation in world affairs. The UN and NATO became cornerstones of Norway’s foreign policy.

Promoting democracy has been an underlying principle for Norway’s post WWII foreign policy. We have also learned to understand that the best guarantee for our own progress is the progress of others.

This might have been some of the reasons for Norway’s early involvement in development cooperation.

The first government project was inaugurated in Kerala in India in 1952. Norway, an important fisheries nation, wanted to teach the skills of Norwegian fishermen to their Indian colleagues. The project has been criticized and was not successful. The Norwegian fishing vessels did not fit very well with the fisheries and culture in India.

However, it was the beginning of Norway’s development cooperation program. Today Norway is at the top of the contribution list with close to 1 % of its GDP in development assistance.

Most of it being used to support mostly Norwegian NGOs spread all over the world where help is needed. This involvement is also the key to how Norway has become an important peace maker – and I will get back to this.

However, it all started long before 1952. As I see it, Norway’s third world involvement began already around 1850 when the first Norwegian missionaries wrote home from Africa and Asia about the misery they saw and the need to help with health care and education.

This low-church missionary movement was later joined by a radical trade-union movement that was at loggerheads with the church on most issues - except the international solidarity.

Together they created a broad political basis for humanitarian and development efforts abroad. They became an important political force that no government could afford to discard.

Norwegian development assistance has been characterized by a close cooperation between government and NGOs, a cooperation that has become known as the Norwegian model or the Norwegian Approach to Peace, Democracy and Development.

This cooperation has been important with respect to the people’s involvement. A story that underlines what I said earlier, that small initiatives and beliefs may become important, is the story of the Namibia Association of Elverum, a small town in Norway.

They started helping SWAPO and the people of Namibia 15 years before it became an independent nation – helping laying the foundation for the independent Namiba -splitting with the apartheid government of South Africa in 1990.

The Namibia Association’s involvement also engaged the Norwegian government, and when Sam Nujuma was elected the first President of the independent Namibia – his first foreign trip went to Elverum in Norway to thank the people for their support.

I mentioned that WWII represented an awakening for Norway. We joined NATO in order to protect our own security. Through development cooperation our third world involvement also became ”realpolitik”.

As we saw a need for a stable world in order to protect our own stability. We realized that a security policy was much more than joining a defense alliance. As the world grew smaller, Africa, Asia and Latin-America came closer.

We could not any longer close our eyes to the third world problems because they would have a direct bearing on our situation. So our development cooperation became part of our security policy.

9-11 made this very clear to all of us. We may argue about what is the cause of terrorism. Some will say that poverty cannot explain terrorism because Bin Laden was very rich. Poverty cannot explain everything, but lack of good governance, social and political frustration, violations of human rights, unjust distribution of resources are all elements that can explain the recruitment of terrorists.

That’s why international efforts to create a just world is so important in order to avoid mass recruitment to terror organizations.

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