Information and Education Bring Peace

The British journalist and author Norman Angell is the only person to have been awarded the Peace Prize for publishing a book. In 1910 he wrote The Great Illusion, of which over two million copies were sold and which was translated into 25 languages.

Angell analyzed the nature of war, concluding that the danger of mutual destruction of both aggressors and defenders had made armed conflict unprofitable. He believed in peaceful development, because the expansion of free trade would create greater interdependence between states and because improved education would make war irrational and uncivilized. Angell's peace concept became known as “angellism” and was disseminated through a network of societies for peace. The outbreak in August 1914 of World War I appeared to refute his main thesis, however.

When in the autumn of 1934 the Nobel Committee awarded Angell the Prize that had been reserved from 1933, he was praised for his work as educator and defender of the League of Nations.