Slashdot Mirror

> The Chinese know full well the prize committee is
> not an agent of the government

Uh... The peace prize committee is appointed by the Norwegian Parliament. There is now a restriction that sitting members of the Parliament can't be on the committee, but it's just made up of past members of the Parliament.

Looking at the makeup of the committee as of today ( http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/nomination_committee/members/ ) I see:

1) Chair was a member of the Parliament 1993-2009, president of the Parliament 2005-2009, Prime minister 1996-1997. On the committee since 2009.

2) Deputy chair was a member of the Parliament 1981-1997, on the committee since 2003.

3) Third member was a member of the Parliament 1977-1993, member of the committee since 1994.

4) Fourth member was a member of the Parliament 1989-1993, on the comittee since 2000.

5) Fifth member was a member of the Parliament 1997-2009, a member of the committee since 2009.

So as of 2010, two of the 5 committee members had been in the Parliament just the year before, and one more had been on the committee ever since she stopped being a member of the Parliament.

Given this setup, and the fact that the committee members have limited terms have to be reappointed by the Parliament, it'd have a pretty hard time not being an agent of the government. Now obviously the Parliament has no _official_ way to influence the decision... but all these people's friends very much "the government" and their standing in the social circles they frequent will depend on their committee's decision.

If they wanted a _really_ independent committee, the selection process for it and the composition of the committee would be radically different. But they want plausible deniability, not real independence.

Now what you say about China certainly seems true to me, and would be true even if the committee _were_ an official agent of the Norwegian government, instead of the unofficial one it actually is.

Don't know much about this guy, but I understand he's a Chinese democracy activist.

He was at Tien An Men in 1989, when hundreds (according to Chinese government) to 10000 (according to Soviet Intelligence) students and freedom activists were killed. He returned from the US (where he was teaching iterature) to China to try to talk the army out of attacking the students on the spot. He was sent into prison and on re-education for that. Now he's in prison for what he has been writing since then, most importantly "Charta 08".

How does that promote peace, really?

"The Norwegian Nobel Committee has long believed that there is a close connection between human rights and peace. Such rights are a prerequisite for the “fraternity between nations” of which Alfred Nobel wrote in his will." Also note that Liu has always been calling for peaceful and gradual reformations. He also risked his life trying to save others and he was punished for that.

matter this much?

http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/nomination_committee/members/

can i round up some tipsy old farts at the golf course and announce their vapid opinion on the world media stage too?

http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/nomination_committee/members/

see those grumpy old swedes?

they picked the award

not the parent teacher association of peoria illinois

now you can wax and wane philosophical all you want about the decline of a true meritocracy in the usa, that's perfectly valid. and you can register a complaint about the empty vapid faddishness of the wine and cheese set in stockholm, again, totally valid

but confusing the two is just a desperate troll

You can read more about the five guys in question at http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/nomination_committee/members/

These are not very left-tilted politicians in Norway. One is a former chairman of the conservative party, and another a former representative from the rightmost party currently in the Storting.

Nope:
"The Peace Prize is one of five prizes that have been awarded annually since 1901 under the auspices of the Nobel Foundation in Stockholm for outstanding contributions in the fields of physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature, and peace."

http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/about_peaceprize/
http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/

The Nobel Jury awarded a peace prize to Fidel Castro. A peace prize for Fidel Castro is like a humanitarian award for Adolf Hitler. Fidel is a Marxist, and the stated goal of Marxists is using violent means to install world-wide Communism. Fidel Castro used military force to keep Cubans prisoner in Cuba, attempting to flee Cuba is punishable by death... how is that different from slavery?

Fidel Castro has never received a Nobel peace price.
Cuba placed a moratorium on the use of capital punishment in 2001. The rest of your post is just ridicululous.