The power and power of peace policy

The peace nation Norway has long been left in peace. Shielded from criticism, the Oslo trial and the handshake between Yassir Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin in front of the White House on 13 September 1993 have been the turning point in the success story of Norwegian Middle East diplomacy. Making enemies friends through secret negotiations was the very prestigious project for recent Norwegian foreign policy. In the last decade – not least in recent years – however, this picture has been turned upside down. The Middle East is not characterized by peace, but a permanent state of emergency and crisis. Although

there does not have to be a direct causal link between this fact and norwegian peace policy, it is nevertheless obvious to take a more critical look at the norwegian role as a “humanitarian superpower”.

Peace policy is not only problematic. Aid researcher Terje Tvedt reminded us last year that the Norwegian model is characterized by a broad consensus maintained by a close political-political coordination of professional, political and journalistic expertise. The Good Samaritan was left without clothes.

Growing criticism

Now two other contributors – in different ways – are out on the same errand. Both have received relatively much media attention, which is far from surprising.

Scientist and historian Hilde Henriksen Waage at the Institute for Peace Research is known for his criticism of Israeli-friendly Norwegian foreign policy. This is particularly evident in her studies of Norway's relations with Israel in the decade following the Second World War, and not least in her studies of the establishment of the Norwegian diplomatic back-channel in 1992-1993. The book on Norway's role in the Middle East peace process is now available from 1993 to 1996: Peacemaking is a risky business – Norway's role in the peace process in the Middle East, 1993-96.

Less well known is writer Arne Ørum. He is a trained theologian, but has many years of practical experience from the Middle East – as a civil servant in the UN, employed by Norwegian People's Aid and also as an adviser in the Directorate of Immigration. In the book Peace in our time, he chooses the same starting point as Waage: An Israeli-friendly Norway mediates between two parties in a completely asymmetric power relationship between Israel and the Palestinians.

Both Ørum and Waage are looking for the same thing: To criticize Norway for lack of neutrality, and thus to run Israel's errand in the peace process. "In a peace process characterized by the totally different power relationship between Israel and the Palestinians, the proximity to Israel has always been the basis for Norway's role as a neutral facilitator," writes Ørum. “Norway could not alter the power asymmetry between Israel and the Palestinians. Norway had to be acceptable not to both parties equally, but primarily to the strongest party, Israel. Norway had no muscles ", writes Waage.

With this, however, the similarities between the two books stop. The methodology and not least the conclusions drawn are very different. Ørum is concerned with the linguistic power camouflage of the peace process. Waage is an elaborate historian looking for empirical findings that can tell in detail what kind of peace broker Norway has been in the various phases of the peace process.

The peace rhetoric

Ørum is not concerned with the peace process itself. Nor the many and varied actors, stages and wrestling that characterized it. Rather, it is the political rhetoric that interests him: It has "served to dampen the impression that Israeli power stood with Palestinian power", Ørum believes. This makes the project ideologically critical. He tries – in Marxist tradition – to undress the power that is hidden in the peace rhetoric's consensus-building strategies that "dampen the impression of power politics".

The peace process is a story about how apparently "neutral" Norwegian peace brokers on the one hand emphasized trust and equality between the parties, but at the same time on the other hand contributed to what Edvard Said has called a "Palestinian Versailles". This could happen because the conflicts of interest were kept hidden through, among other things, "pretense", "denial of realities", "rejection of criticism", and that a "small group of people from the absolute elite of social democracy" acquired a unique room for maneuver.

So something went wrong the Norwegian Middle East diplomacy. Nevertheless, the book is not a critique of peace idealism as such, only of an idealistic rhetoric that became a "mouthpiece for power politics". The realities of the occupying power's policy and the marginalization of international law became invisible, as the very main causes of the conflict were not discussed critically, but postponed to so-called "final negotiations", is the argument. Ørum therefore claims that Norway with its peace rhetoric – where trust, silence and consensus took precedence over power-political realities – helped to consolidate the occupation contrary to international law and prolong the conflict.

The process itself – and the rhetoric associated with it – became more important than the results of the process. Because Norway was unable to handle power politics, it was "overtaken by realities". Through a separate language and rules of the game, the peace policy was somehow protected from the outside world.

Excited, but problematic

Besides Terje Tvedt, Ørum is one of the very few in this country who has chosen to study Norwegian peace policy discourse analytically. The perspective is therefore not only critical, but also innovative. Ørum shows how the power of political practices contributes to creating continuity where breaches are expected. The Oslo process' use of secrecy, new professional expertise, broad consensus, and not least a paradoxical downplaying of international law principles, are examples of this.

Best of all is Ørum's sociological analysis of how the research foundation Fafo and the small social democratic elite layer where Terje Rød Larsen, his wife Mona Juul, State Secretary Jan Egeland and later Foreign Minister Johan Jørgen Holst, were central, took control of Norwegian peace policy.

This part of the book sets out an important story about how foreign policy in a small state like Norway can be turned into an almost private matter. This is in stark contrast to the story of the Oslo process as a success story, which has long been the official version.

Furthermore, this section provides a particularly good description of how close the relationship between research and politics, and thus also between knowledge and power, can be.

Peace in our time however, is less exciting as foreign policy analysis. Ørum chooses a perspective that seems outdated when he points out the so-called "realists" from the years after World War II. The basis for Ørum's claim of an idealistic peace rhetoric is in fact a presumption that there is an actual distinction between so-called “realpolitik” and “idealpolitik”. Such an assumption is problematic when it comes to a small state like Norway. This is because – and this is important – that idealistic thinking is no longer a matter for independent critics, but rather is the state's own policy. Real politics is another word for the great powers' power politics. Ideal politics has been linked to their critics. The concept pair is therefore difficult to use for a small state like Norway – ideal politics has been the state's own policy.

In a similar way, but perhaps even more problematic, Ørum's surprising assumption – the discourse analysis taken into account – is about a distinction between language and reality, between "rhetoric" on the one hand and "reality" on the other. The point of discourse analysis is to see language and rhetoric as an effective part of reality.

And finally: the book is marred by a lack of primary sources. The conclusions become repetitive, and also too general. Important contradictions are overlooked. Furthermore, it becomes unclear to what extent the rhetoric Ørum identifies has emerged from deliberate elite manipulation, or as a more unconscious result of linguistic structures. In other words, Ørum is in danger of becoming as strong a rhetorician as the foreign policy elite he himself criticizes.

Peace mediator Norway

Hilde Henriksen Waage is not as critical in Peacemaking is a risky business. First and foremost, she is rather a historian. Probably all the fuss about the book's publication, including the significant criticism of the use of sources from the actors involved, tells more about Norwegian peace policy than about the author. Maybe she's stepping on some sore toes.

Waage's narrative of Norwegian Middle East policy – based on just over fifty interviews and a wealth of graded material – is also less monolithic and more ambiguous than Ørum's. Waage narrates the most, explains a little, and asks a few key questions: “How did this small Scandinavian country come to be involved in one of the deadliest and most intractable conflicts of the 20th century? How can the outcome of the process be explained? ”

Waage's answer is that Norwegian peace policy in the Middle East was not developed in a vacuum, but rather as a result of conscious Israel-friendliness in the Norwegian post-war period.

However, Norwegian peace diplomacy cannot be explained by reference to Israeli support alone. It was precisely because of, not in spite of, the close ties with Israel that Arafat already in 1979 saw Norway as a relevant player. In other words, Norway also wanted to help the Palestinians.

Although Waage tells in detail about how the Norwegian mediator role changed character from unofficial and academic "facilitator role" in the first months of 1993, to a more active, official political "mediator role" months before the agreement was signed, the asymmetric power relationship between the parties determined the course. . Where Ørum talks about the Norwegian foreign policy power elite, Waage talks about the powerlessness of the same actors. Where Ørum emphasizes the structures, Waage emphasizes the many actors who played key roles. In Waage's account, the Norwegians become tragic heroes: They are in the service of the good cause, and never give up despite an almost impossible starting point. Seen in such a light, Waage's book becomes – consciously or unconsciously – a kind of defense of Norway's friendliness to Israel.

Waage tries to answer why had to be like that. The power in the negotiating game made it impossible for Norway to criticize Israel, as the negotiations would then break down. Waage is far from as suspicious of power as Ørum is. Rather, the book shows that she is concerned with what Norway actually did, given the limited room for maneuver in the negotiation situation.

Here, however, it rains a bit for Waage as well. There is a gap between the assumption she makes: “Israel decided the conditions and the rules of the game. Norway could like this or not, but there was nothing it could do about it ”

And the description she gives of Norway as a tragic hero in the negotiations, where Norway took advantage of its role as a small state: “They [the Norwegian mediators] were extremely achievement-oriented. They strongly believed in their ability to make a difference, even on the world stage ”.

This is a page of the book that was undercommunicated in the media debate that followed the release. It was exclusively about whether Norway lagged for Israel or not. The Norwegians took chances – and acted, is Waage's point. Understood this way, gives Peacemaking is a risky business several good examples of the dynamics of international politics.

However, the book is further hampered by a slightly too simple concept of power – only military power counts, for Waage. Thus, in a paradoxical way, she underfocuses her own empirical findings, which precisely emphasize the complexity and possibilities of international negotiations. She seems to think that the Oslo process could have had a different outcome with a strong military force rising behind the mirror. Now, however, all indications are that the United States – the world's strongest military power – is not creating peace in the Middle East either. Waage is therefore hampered by his traditional small-state coverage, which is in fact in line with both Norwegian historical research in general and the dominant narrative of Norwegian success in the Middle East.

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