Norse Federation Centenary

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Your Majesty, Mayor, Ambassadors, Excellencies, all of you at home and abroad – hjemme og ute – to quote the title of your Norwegian publication,

First of all, congratulations to you all, to the Norse Federation, on your centenary!

You have given us the much loved word gamlelandet – “the old country”. The old country is a special place for very many of the Norse Federation’s members and supporters. The picture is perhaps a romantic one – of beautiful scenery steeped with intense feeling – but it is nevertheless firmly rooted in family ties, in surnames linking you to the place your family came from, a place where friends and family may still be living, your origins. It is a real place – not least in your mind.

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Another expression we frequently hear is “our new countrymen”. If it were meaningful, we could have talked of “our old countrymen” rather than emigrants, Norwegian descendents, sons of Norway or – an expression I am less happy with – “ethnic Norwegians”. What associations does the epithet “ethnic Norwegians” give, what does it say about human dignity and values. I prefer the term “our new countrymen”.

Meanwhile, our “old countrymen” are genuine, living bearers – not of nationalism – but of enthusiasm, pride, identity, stories and history, memories and diversity. They represent a core of positive national feeling – of international feeling, of openness.

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So, dear old and new countrymen, I would like to take this opportunity on the occasion of the Norse Federation’s centenary to say a few words about the sense of belonging, identify and openness.

All anniversaries, whether they are celebrating 50 years or 100, invite us to look back in time. This is useful and it is important. Our knowledge is a result of all that we have learnt from the past. But it is in the future that we will be living, and it is there that the challenges lie.

Several centenaries fall this year. Edvard Grieg died in 1907, and we had the opportunity to enjoy some of the highlights of Grieg Year in Bergen and Oslo in May and June. Sigrid Undset published her first book – the remarkable Fru Marta Oulie – 100 years ago, and 20 years later she was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. She lived in the US during the Second World War, where she worked for Norway’s liberation, and was also a member of the Norse Federation board. A couple of weeks ago, Bjerkebæk, her home in Lillehammer, was reopened to the public – now with the addition of a fine new building. She wrote in her first novel at the age of 25 that, “... it isn’t true that the past is only what has been.”

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And what was the picture in 1907?

Here are some highlights. Oklahoma becomes the 46th state in the US. Korea becomes a Japanese protectorate. Robert Baden-Powell organises the first scout camp – it is not the last. King Oscar II of Sweden dies. Astrid Lindgren, the author of Pippi Longstocking, is born, and so is our own great writer Halldis Moren Vesaas. The first women members of parliament have recently been elected in Finland (1906) and universal suffrage is beginning to be introduced in Europe.

And on 21 June 1907, the Norse Federation is founded. What was the picture in Norway then?

A few figures can tell us quite a lot – about Norway, and about the Norwegian men and women who were searching for new opportunities. The population of Norway in 1907 was around 2.3 million. Well over 20 000 people emigrated that year, and altogether 190 000 emigrated between 1900 and 1910.

They took with them half the excess of births. In relation to the population, the emigration from Norway was one of the highest in Europe. Indeed a number of communities in Agder and Rogaland still have a lower population than they did 100 years ago.

Norwegians left Norway and headed in particular for the US, Canada and other countries with more and better opportunities, countries where – as we have seen – there were not quite so many “deficiencies in economic and social conditions”, to quote from a public report.

And here are some other figures. In 1909, there were 9500 children officially registered as employed in Norwegian industry. This is a higher figure than in countries like Sweden, Great Britain and the US. In 1905 a servant girl earned 133 kroner a year. The wages for a first engineer at sea were 178 kroner – a month. Norway was a poor country and there was great social disparity. 

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The backdrop, the motivation behind the establishment of the Norse Federation in 1907 remains relevant for us and our value choices today. The Federation has its roots in issues related to identity and openness.

Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson was “high and low” in the building of the Norwegian nation and its institutions, and he had more than one finger in the pie when the Norse Federation was established. Bjørnson spoke and wrote in capital letters, and he urged Norwegians who travelled to other countries to take their national identity with them and let the world see what it meant to be Norwegian. He wanted them to bring new input, new ideals to the countries they settled in.

He wanted them to embrace their new fatherland and at the same time retain their own identity. There need not be any contradiction here.

The Norse Federation has members on every continent, and it is far more than a preserver of Norwegian traditions. In its publications and on its webpages I can read news from chapters in New Orleans, Madrid, London, New Zealand and  – of course – the Midwest: Red River Valley, Minneapolis, Northfield, Decorah.

And it is natural to look towards the US as the most important country for the federation and for Norwegians who have left their homeland, for there were thousands – indeed more than a million – who followed in the wake of the 52 hopeful souls onboard Restaurationen in 1825.

Times change. Today there are more Norwegian students in Australia than in the US, and the Norwegian colonies in Spain are larger than many Norwegian villages. There are long processions in the Canary Islands on our national day – 17 May, and as many 100 000 Norwegians travel to Thailand each year.

Students and other young Norwegians must be allowed to travel and study where they choose. But we regret that fewer are going to the US to study. One reason is that higher education in the US is of such high calibre. Another reason is that students abroad build bridges and create ties. So all positive Norwegian-American forces and networks must pull together and seek to encourage more students to study in the US. I am delighted that Ben Whitney, the US Ambassador in Oslo has directed attention to how the process of becoming a student in the US can be simplified.

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This may be a digression, but I would like to point out how much I welcome the way both the board and the members of the Norse Federation are addressing the challenges we face in our globalised world. These include major differences in patterns of travel, forms of communication and professions compared with 100 years ago. The events the Norse Federation has organised such as exchange programmes, Norwegian classes, the Norwegian language summer school, Norway’s expatriate parliament and Leif Eiriksson Day, as well as all the other “days”, meetings and arrangements by small chapters – whether or not lefse is served – all these are very positive, and relevant to our time, as is the federation’s use of new technology and knowledge in its extensive webpages.

It is not every centenarian organisation that is so well able to adapt to change. For there has been a dramatic development from reading rooms providing annual volumes of the venerable regional newspaper Stavanger Aftenblad to norway.com.

The main task of the Norse Federation – the key as I see it – is to continue to act as a link between Norway and Norwegian communities abroad, to spread knowledge, information and understanding, and to encourage participation. This is done differently in 2007 than it was in 1907. But one factor remains unchanged – the rock solid importance of people-to-people ties.

When he was a young boy during the Second World War, His Majesty the King spent five long years as a guest of the US. Ties were forged through the Norwegian-American community that still hold, that have become stronger. These ties are part of the special relationship between our countries; they are some of the threads that are woven together to form the tapestry of North American and Norwegian interests in education, research, business, civil society and the cooperation between our authorities.

And again and again we return to the most important factor: people. Words such as “connections” and “ties” can sound abstract. But they about people. People who are real. You who are here today. It is you who fill the concept of “special relationship” with meaning, with confidence.

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I have another message that I feel is relevant on an occasion such as today’s – a message about us and about the future.

The Norse Federation’s centenary is a good opportunity to remind ourselves of the importance of maintaining identity, fostering understanding and being open. This is a challenge that millions of migrants are facing all over the world today, and that their host countries are also facing. Yesterday was World Refugee Day. It was a stark reminder of a desperate, brutal world. We see the same desperation in people who are reaching out to us, people who are looking towards Norway in fear of their lives.

The idea of emigrants taking their traditions, knowledge and national identity with them to their new home countries – which Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson attached such importance to – takes us right into the debate on integration in our own country, our own city, today.

The integration, in other words, of our new countrymen. Although, many of them are not “new” at all, but second and third generation Norwegian citizens. And they are all a natural part of the new, expanded Norwegian “we”, of Norway today. A country where Mohammad is one of the most popular names for boys born in the capital city.

We have great respect for Norwegian Americans, who were very much new countrymen when they arrived. They have maintained their language, customs, traditions and identity, and they have continued to import cultural stimuli from the “old country”. They are people who have contributed to diversity, to the “salad bowl” as Americans call it – the wide range of colourful ingredients that make up the whole.

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It is this very image we need to remind ourselves of in the year 2007, when we see that immigrants need to retain their identity, roots and networks from the countries they come from at the same time as they become part of the international society of our country. What they bring with them may seem alien to us, but the point is that the concept of “we” or “us” needs to be expanded, whether we are talking about domestic policy or foreign policy.

The immigrant population accounts for more than 8% of Norway’s total population, amounting to almost 390 000 people. That is a large and important part of the Norwegian “we”, not a case of “them” against “us”

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Dear Friends, Your Majesty,

The Norse Federation has taught me three things.

Firstly, the importance of diversity and openness.

Secondly, while traditions must be maintained, new stimuli are also needed. Identity needs to both be rooted in the past and constantly renewed.

Thirdly, that all the communities the Norse Federation represents have played an important role in the Norwegian authorities’ relations with the US, Canada and many, many other countries.

We have developed a relationship of trust. And from your history we can trace lines into the future – we can glimpse a future that has room for everyone, where we can all take our place and help to form society both in our own country and at the international level.

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We all tell a story of who we are and who we could be. Each and every one of us has his individual history. And, I would like to add, we are all living together with our common history. We have all this to bring with us into the future.

I wish the Norse Federation a happy 100th anniversary!