Anniversary event at NUPI

On Tuesday, I attended the last of NUPI’s Anniversary seminars. As most of you know, NUPI and PRIO are of the same age, both 50 years in 2009. The seminar on Tuesday had two highlights. Firstly, there was a debate between six recent foreign ministers of Norway (Thorvald Stoltenberg, Bjørn Tore Godal, Knut Vollebæk, Thorbjørn Jagland, Jan Petersen and Jonas Gahr Støre). The filmed debate, in Norwegian, can be seen here. The second highlight was a round of prepared commentaries by three researchers: Iver Neumann, Nina Græger and Torbjørn Knutsen. Following the seminar, there was beer and sausages (courtesy of PRIOR, but then PRIO was never asked, which was unfortunate - I happen to be one of very few with relationship to both, as director her, but also the happy owner of a farm with a henhouse). The NUPI event was very well attended by scholars, politicians, government officials and the media, and it was a good occasion to talk to several of them.

The debate about the independence of research on foreign and security policy continues. Some of you have seen my response in Morgenbladet some two weeks ago, as well as the editorial in Ny Tid last week. Today, Dagbladet carried an op. ed. by Nils Petter, in which he offers a staunch defense of PRIO and the principle of independent research financing, and offers alternative explanations as to why there is relatively little interest in critically examining Norway’s peace and reconciliation policy. And, early in the week, Bergens Tidende published firm critique of NUPI director Egeland, while also raising the general concern about MFA financing and the independence of research for all institutes. I see scholarly quality as the key to upholding our independence. As long as we maintain our ability to bring about research that is of high scholarly quality, at the same time as it is original and relevant, we will also be able to protect our independence.