The 2024 Mohn Prize laureate is professor emeritus Oran Young. A champion of Arctic collaboration and holistic perspectives on the North for five decades, he has hopes for a better way forward.
By: Kjetil Rydland // UiT The Arctic University of Norway
Young says he has spent his professional life seeking to understand the roles that social institutions can, and sometimes do, play in fostering international cooperation on issues of common concern.
In an Arctic context, perhaps no single individual has influenced that understanding more than Young. He is an international leader in studies of international governance and environmental institutions and the world’s foremost expert on these topics in the Arctic.
He has contributed to establishing a knowledge-based public discourse about management in the Arctic and an informed dialogue with political decision-makers. His political and scientific roles have been key to ensuring peaceful international cooperation and sustainable management in the Arctic.
In its nomination for Oran Young as the 2024 laureate, the Scientific Committee of the Mohn Prize unanimously views Dr Young as an esteemed leader in promoting the Arctic as a region to be studied holistically, and recognises him for his research on international regimes and institutional dynamics in the Arctic.
They emphasise his contributions to investigations into the human dimensions of Arctic environmental change, the role of the Arctic in a changing global order, and the governance of the Arctic Ocean. Further, they commemorate his contributions to our thinking on the political economy of resource management globally and on the needed contours of governance in a changing world order.
Oran Young helped establish and was the first director of the Institute of Arctic Studies at Dartmouth College in the 1960s. During the 1980s and 1990s, he played a significant role in establishing key Arctic institutions such as the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), the University of the Arctic (UArctic), and the Arctic Environmental Protection Strategy (AEPS), which would lead to the formation of the Arctic Council.
Young has been in leading positions in global change research for several decades, among others as founding chair of the Committee on the Human Dimensions of Global Change of the US National Academy of Sciences, founding co-chair of the Global Carbon Project, a member of the US Polar Research Board. and co-chair of the Arctic Human Development Report in 2004.
When it was announced that Young would be the 2024 Mohn Prize laureate, he highlighted the changing geopolitical landscape of the Arctic. He noted that while the post-Cold War era offered opportunities for East–West cooperation, the current climate of heightened tensions and global interest in the Arctic presents new challenges.
However, he does not believe that these challenges are impossible to overcome. The absence of severe conflicts in the region itself and the presence of many issues requiring collaborative efforts makes cooperation and solutions possible. But he believes that the institutions of yesteryear are not well suited for the conditions prevailing in the 2020s and 2030s. And modest adjustments will not be sufficient.
Young calls for a re-invention of current Arctic institutions. He does not claim to have a solution, but urges creative engagement between members of the policy and science communities to come up with solutions.
In his Mohn Prize acceptance speech, Young underlined how the common narrative of peace and cooperation in the Arctic after the Cold War is the reason why the Arctic is now relatively free of conflict. But he believes we need new narratives that embrace local, regional, national, and international perspectives, narratives that give everyone voices and real opportunities, based on mutual respect.
Oran Young says that being selected to receive the 2024 Mohn Prize is an exceptional honour, the capstone of his 50 years of active engagement in Arctic affairs.
THE MOHN PRIZE
The Mohn Prize recognises outstanding research related to the Arctic. The award also aims at setting issues that are central to the further development of the Arctic on the national and international agenda.
Named after Henrik Mohn (1835–1916), the founder of Norwegian meteorological research and director general of the Norwegian Meteorological Institute from its inception in 1866 until 1913.
The prize is awarded jointly by Academia Borealis – The Academy of Sciences and Letters of Northern Norway, Tromsø Research Foundation, and UiT The Arctic University of Norway. The 2 million NOK prize is awarded biennially.
ORAN YOUNG
1962 – BA in Government, Harvard University
1965 – PhD in Political Science, Yale University
1968 – Professor of Environmental Studies and director of the Institute of Arctic Studies at Dartmouth College
Professor emeritus at Bren School of Environmental Science and Management at the University of California Santa Barbara
Young has published 20 books, 25 edited volumes, and more than 150 articles and book chapters
International Arctic Social Sciences Association’s Honorary Lifetime Membership Award
Russian Academy of Sciences’ Vernadsky Medal
IASC Medal
Honorary doctorates from UiT The Arctic University of Norway and the University of Lapland