PRIO

PRIO
Abbreviation	PRIO
Formation	1959
Founder	Johan Galtung
Headquarters	Oslo, Norway
Type	Research institute
Staff	75
Interests	peace
Sponsored by	Norway/Ministry of Foreign Affairs

The Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO) is based in Oslo, Norway. Founded by the renowned Johan Galtung in 1959, it has changed drastically over the years, from a think tank developing remarkably innovative peace solutions, to an institute occupied with "just wars" and “democratic peace” that legitimizes any war of aggression.

Own words

The Institute's website reports that “The institute is a non-profit peace research institute (established in 1959) whose overarching purpose is to conduct research on the conditions for peaceful relations between states, groups and people. The institute is independent, international and interdisciplinary, and explores issues related to all facets of peace and conflict. To remain at the cutting edge of peace research, PRIO is both proactively involved in identifying new trends in global conflict, and oriented toward formulating and documenting new understandings and responses”

Staff

Staff included professor Ola Tunander, who worked there for almost 30 years. In 2013, PRIO asked him in an e-mail to accept “quality assurance measures [that] relate to all printed publications, including shorter texts such as up-eds [sic]”, uniquely among staff being assigned a person to check his work. Tunander stated "This commitment to control everything I wrote, was so strong that it can only be explained by the pressure from the Americans. A candidate for the position as National Security Adviser to President Ronald Reagan, in no uncertain terms, let me know that what I had written “would have consequences” for me.

"In the spring of 2015, PRIO’s management had decided that I should retire. I said that this was not up to them and that I had to talk to my union, NTL. My immediate superior then replied that it did not matter what the union said. The decision about my retirement had already been made. Every day, for a full month, he came into my office to discuss my retirement." Thanks to union support, he got an agreement, where he would retire in May 2016 in exchange for continuing as Research Professor Emeritus at PRIO.

“Researchers who question the legitimacy of US wars, seem to experience being ousted from their positions in research and media institutions.”
Ola Tunander (6 March 2021) 

 

Sponsor

Event	Description
Norway/Ministry of Foreign Affairs	A significant donor to NGOs and planning organizations. Many of the recipients dovetail with NATO objectives like regime changes and controlling the narrative.

 

Related Document

Title	Type	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
File:PRIO Annual report 2009.pdf	report	2009		The 2009 annual report.

 

Documents sourced from PRIO

Title	Type	Subject(s)	Publication date	Author(s)	Description
Document:Democratic State v Deep State	essay	Deep politics Deep state "Democracy"	1 January 2008	Ola Tunander	An excellent introduction to deep politics. By clarifying the real role of the Secret Intelligence Services and the policy agenda they under firm control in most Western 'Democracies' (especially the UKUSA nations), it demonstrates the irrelevance of the party-political masquerade.
Document:The use of terrorism to construct world order	paper	Deep politics Operation Gladio Strategy of tension War on Terror/Purposes	10 September 2004	Ola Tunander
File:Isenberg Private Military Contractors.pdf	paper	Private military company Blackwater	January 2009	David Isenberg
File:PRIO Annual report 2009.pdf	report	PRIO	2009		The 2009 annual report.
File:The Use of Terrorism to Construct World Order.pdf	paper	Deep politics War on Terror/Purposes	9 September 2004	Ola Tunander	A Paper presented at the Fifth Pan-European International Relations Conference (Panel 28 Geopolitics) Netherlands Congress Centre, The Hague.

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