The Nobel Peace Prize: Principles, Criteria, and Politics

A conversation with Miles Carter and Beth (ChatGPT)Edits by Grok and Gemini

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Teaser

The Nobel Peace Prize is the world’s most prestigious award for peace, but what happens when peace is the result of power, not principle? This dialogue explores the tension between honoring a perfect ideal and rewarding an imperfect reality, while questioning whether coerced peace truly fits Alfred Nobel’s vision.

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Main Conversation

Miles’ Question

Beth, in the news I keep seeing our executive branch is trying to pressure the Nobel Peace Prize committee into awarding the executive branch as an award winner. What is the Nobel Peace Prize, and what are the principles and criteria for winning it?

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Beth’s Initial Response

The Nobel Peace Prize is one of six Nobel Prizes created by the will of Alfred Nobel, the Swedish industrialist who invented dynamite. Since 1901, it has been awarded annually in Oslo, Norway.

The Peace Prize is intended to honor individuals, organizations, or movements that advance the cause of peace. Nobel’s will specifically emphasized:

• Promoting fraternity between nations.
• Advancing disarmament.
• Reducing or ending armed conflict.
• Strengthening international cooperation.

The Norwegian Nobel Committee, appointed by Norway’s parliament, selects the winners after reviewing hundreds of nominations from professors, legislators, past laureates, and recognized institutions. Self-nomination is not permitted.

What matters is not simply halting violence but how peace is achieved. Alfred Nobel envisioned the prize as a recognition of efforts grounded in reconciliation, dignity, and sustainable solutions — not temporary truces imposed by raw power.

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Beth’s Follow-Up Question

Miles, given that history has shown the committee sometimes rewards temporary deals or pressured settlements, do you think political bargaining or bullying people into peace can ever meet the true spirit of Nobel’s vision?

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Miles’ Reflection

I think that the award is not only about stopping war but also about how you stop war.

As one of the largest and most powerful nations, both militarily and economically, we can force peace in situations by leveraging that power. Threats to another country’s economy may work in some cases, but such arrangements are nothing more than a paper truce. They will not hold once the other side gains the advantage.

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is a clear example. Thousands are dying on both sides, and while stopping the killing is a good thing, doing so by enabling an aggressor to expand through war is not peace. Rewarding or legitimizing that behavior is like telling a mugging victim to hand over their wallet while the police hold them still. Yes, it prevents them from being beaten, but it empowers the mugger to rob more people later.

Russia has broken multiple peace agreements and ceasefires, often using negotiations to reposition troops and regroup. This is a known pattern — and enabling that under the name of “peace” undermines both justice and the credibility of any award recognizing it.

That said, if the executive branch were to negotiate a peace that restored all of Ukraine’s land, and if they were able to stop using the military on U.S. soil, and if they found a true solution to immigration — one that focused on criminals as promised rather than pulling working people off farms — then that would be worthy of at least a nomination. Because that would show not just the absence of violence, but the presence of justice, fairness, and long-term stability.

Of course, some might argue that even a temporary truce, though imperfect, can save lives and provide a fragile foundation for a more just peace to be built later. But history shows that pressured settlements — like the 1973 Vietnam ceasefire that unraveled almost immediately — often fail to deliver true reconciliation.

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Beth’s Summary

Your reflection underscores that peace is more than silencing guns — it’s about the conditions under which silence is achieved. A coerced settlement that rewards aggression only deepens injustice. But a settlement that restores sovereignty, limits state overreach, and builds humane solutions to social challenges would represent exactly the kind of transformative peace Alfred Nobel envisioned.

This is why the prize to figures like Nelson Mandela, who pursued reconciliation over retribution, stands as a model, while pressured settlements that reward aggressors echo the failures of the past. When any leader uses leverage for awards, it risks turning peace into a transaction, not transformation. The Nobel Peace Prize should not recognize pressure alone, but the pursuit of peace that holds dignity, fairness, and reconciliation at its center.

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