Climate activist Greta Thunberg gets nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for the second consecutive year
The 17-year-old climate activist is nominated by two Swedish parliamentarians for her pointed efforts to encourage young people to protest and demand effective climate action from lawmakers.
For the second consecutive year, Swedish climate change activist Greta Thunberg has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Swedish politicians Jens Holm and Hakan Svenneling nominated the 17-year-old for this year’s award for her pointed efforts to encourage young people to protest and demand effective climate action from lawmakers. She has been calling out lawmakers who are not taking a stand against climate change.
Greta Thunberg in Stockholm, Sweden
The Swedish politicians who belong to the country's Left Party, filed the nomination on February 1, citing that Greta “has worked hard to make politicians open their eyes to the climate crisis” and “her action for reducing our emissions and complying with the Paris Agreement is therefore also an act of making peace.”
The Paris Agreement calls on all the governments to help curb climate change and combat the rise in global temperatures by reducing emissions.
Greta has become the face of climate action across the world. Her organisation ‘Fridays for Future’ has also been nominated by the Swedish parliamentarians. From being the only person protesting outside the Swedish parliament every Friday, to leading the largest climate action strike, Greta’s efforts have helped maximise people’s efforts to demand effective climate action from lawmakers, governments, and the international community.
In 2019, she was among four people who were named the winners of Right Livelihood Award, also known as the “Alternative Nobel”, and was also named TIME Magazine’s “Person of the Year.”
If she wins, she’ll be the 18th woman to win
If Greta Thunberg or any other woman wins the prize this year, they will become the 18th woman to receive the Peace Prize and the 54th woman to hold a Nobel Prize. Comparing these figures to the male laureates reveals a stark picture. There are 866 male Nobel laureates and 90 Nobel Peace Prize winners since the inception of the Nobel Prize in 1901.
In the last decade, a considerable number of women have won the prize. Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai won the Peace Prize for championing women’s and girl’s rights to education alongside child rights activist Kailash Satyarthi in 2014.
In 2011, three women - Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, activist Leymah Gbowee, and Yemeni leader Tawakkol Karman won the prize “for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and women’s rights to full participation in peace-building work.” In 2018, human rights activist Nadia Murad was the last woman to win the award.
However, there has been a large lapse in time when women’s achievements have not been recognised or honoured. After Marie Curie became the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in 1903, Maria Goeppert-Mayer was the next woman laureate — 60 years later.
(Edited by Suman Singh)
