Nobel Peace Prize for Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet

[REDY]

The organization are indeed decades old. Some of them indirectly and lately participated to the revolution in 2010 that brought down the President-Dictator and triggered the so called Arab Spring. They were "infiltrated" by the former regime by the way and a huge power fight happened within those organizations because of that. Nobel Prize is not however given to them for their struggle back than, but for the period 2013-2014 where Tunisia was already well after the Arab Spring, elected a Constituent Assembly (one that was supposed to write a new Constitution and organize a new election). It was a unstable period in which two political assassination were committed against anti-Islamist MP, public opinion was heavily divided between supporter of the coalition in power led by the Islamist Party and the opponent led by nationalist and lefties. That is when the Quartet played a major role bringing all parties together into the negotiation table and imposed a "technocratic" government. The Military coup against Morsy in Egypt helped in that regards immensely to be honest as the Islamist in Tunisia feared they ll have the same fate if they do not show more flexibility.
To be honest, what the Quartet did was crucial as Tunisia could have ended like Libya in a total anarchy or like Egypt back into ruthless dictatorship.

Thank you for informations. Nobel prize for peace seems to be in good hands this year.

Who is next? Netanyahu for not invading Gaza this year? George Bush for not invading Iran or North Korea?

For some laureats was pattern:
1.Start genocide
2.Stop it for while
3.Get Nobel Prize

 

[Snerk]

One mockery of the prize and what it's supposed to stand for is enough for me.

Imagine if they gave out the oscars to me and you this year, for best actor and best supporting actor. We didn't even act in anything! Well, maybe you did, but I sure didn't.
And I don't really take the oscars seriously right now, but I can see that they are more or less given to one of the best actors in Hollywood each year. If me and you got the oscars this year though, that facade would be all but gone, and I'd consider the oscars to be a joke. Wouldn't you?

IMO there's a disconnect between your arguments and reality.

Obama had established a clear change in rhetoric coming out of the white house when he recieved the award. The nobel committee, fuelled by a hearty helping of NATO loyalism, gave him the award hoping this change would manifest itself in actual change of politics. It didn't, and the award is now arguably the biggest stain on the committees reputation.

 

[Formaldehyde]

It is nowhere near the "biggest stain". But it is certainly one of the bigger ones among many.

 

[warpus]

Obama had established a clear change in rhetoric coming out of the white house when he recieved the award.

He basically won the award for not being Bush. The point is that he got it for nothing that he actually did, which is what the award is supposed to be for - for past actions, not future ones.

Ever since then I could never take this award seriously. Who could?

 

[Wolfbeckett]

Everyone complaining about the Nobel peace prize being stained or whatever is forgetting one important thing: it's a joke anyway.

Talk to me when they win the prize in physics, chemistry, or medicine and I'll be impressed, those are the only ones that matter.

 

[Snerk]

He basically won the award for not being Bush. The point is that he got it for nothing that he actually did, which is what the award is supposed to be for - for past actions, not future ones.

In addition to acknowledging past actions, the award is being used to promote future change too. By bringing momentum to areas where there is good potential for a positive change. One can certainly criticize this strategy, as it risks awarding unworthy candidates.

The Obama prize was one of these, and it failed on all levels.

 

[Lohrenswald]

Everyone complaining about the Nobel peace prize being stained or whatever is forgetting one important thing: it's a joke anyway.

Talk to me when they win the prize in physics, chemistry, or medicine and I'll be impressed, those are the only ones that matter.

How do they matter in a way the peace price doesn't?

 

[warpus]

the award is being used to promote future change too.

I thought only in the context of the person receiving it already having accomplished something worthy of the prize in the first place.

Either way I don't think I'll ever again view the Nobel peace prize as something to care about, but I admit I'd probably feel sentimental towards it if it was a Polish institution or something. Or Canadian.

 

[Zkribbler]

That's a nice list, Formaldhyde -
EU - 6 decades of peace and prosperity; doesn't matter.
Obama - Turns the U.S. away from unilateral adventurism and unnecessary wars; doesn't matter.
Huge steps towards peace in the Middle East; doesn't matter.
Ending apartheid; doesn't matter.
Ending war in Vietnam; doesn't matter.
Jeez.

 

[Formaldehyde]

The EU is still a loose coalition of countries, and for the first decades it was nothing but an economic coalition. So claiming it is somehow responsible for "peace" for 6 decades is nothing but sheer propaganda, especially given how many countries still belong to NATO and continue to threaten global thermonuclear war over essentially nothing by continuing to pretend the Cold War still exists.

As Warpus pointed out, Obama was picked based on what he was supposed to do, which is patently absurd in the first place. The US is just as imperialistic and engages in hegemony just as much as it has done in the recent past. The only difference is that the country is no longer being run by an idiot, which is obviously no reason to hand out a Nobel Peace Prize to a president who has escalated assassination by drone, done absolutely nothing to control Israeli warmongering, and has apparently even reinstituted secret torture and murder of innocent people by foreign "friends".

There have obviously been no "huge steps forward towards peace in the Middle East".

As far as ending apartheid is concerned, I only picked one of those names as being completely undeserving of any award. De Klerk just happened to be the last ultraconservative racist who was the ruler of South Africa before they finally had to permanently change. He merely saw the inevitable handwriting on the wall:

For most of his career, de Klerk had a very conservative reputation. The NP's Transvaal branch was historically the most staunchly conservative wing of the party, and he supported continued segregation of universities while Minister of National Education. It thus came as a surprise when in 1989 he placed himself at the head of verligte ("enlightened") forces within the governing party who had come to believe that apartheid could not be maintained forever. This wing favoured beginning negotiations while there was still time to get reasonable terms.

In 1993, de Klerk and Mandela were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their work in ending apartheid. The awarding of the prize to de Klerk was controversial, especially in the light of de Klerk's reported admission that he ordered a massacre of supposed Azanian Peoples' Liberation Army fighters, including teenagers, shortly before going to Oslo in 1993.[15]

In 1996, de Klerk was offered the Harper Fellowship at Yale Law School. He later declined, citing protests at the university.[16] De Klerk did, however, speak at Central Connecticut State University the day before his fellowship would have begun.

The people who supposedly "ended" the war in Vietnam were also the ones responsible for it continuing for so long. Giving the Nobel Peace Prize to a warmongers merely because the fighting eventually ended is beyond ludicrous. This is particularly true with what we now know about how Kissinger tried to bomb them back into the stone ages at the very end. I can't imagine a supposed human being who is less deserving of any award, much less a so-called "peace prize".

"Jeez".

 

[Tee Kay]

I feel sorry for the Tunisian NDQ; the prize goes to people who deserve it for once, but the prize is now good as disgraced

 

[Zkribbler]

The people who supposedly "ended" the war in Vietnam were also the ones responsible for it continuing for so long.

Call me crazy, but I think it's a good thing when warriors make peace.