Ans.Red.

The Students’ Peace Prize 2023 is Awarded to a Russian Student Magazine: Why? 

Ans.Red.
The Students’ Peace Prize 2023 is Awarded to a Russian Student Magazine: Why? 
 

The Students’ Peace Prize 2023 is Awarded to a Russian Student Magazine: Why?  

Send in by Åse Vigdisdatter Nytrø

 
 

The Students’ Peace Prize is awarded on behalf of all Norwegian students biannually to a student or student organization noted for their efforts in promoting human rights, peace, or democracy. On previous occasions the prize has been awarded to the student group METU LGBTI+ Solidarity (2019), a student group at the Middle East Technical University of Ankara, Turkey, for their work on promoting a diverse and inclusive education, and to the Libyan law student Hajer Sharief (2017), for her progressive work within peaceful bridge building and female representation in peace negotiations, especially in connection with the Libyan civil war.   

 

This year the Students’ Peace Prize is awarded to the Russian student news magazine DOXA Magazine. DOXA was founded at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow in 2017, and has since then taken on discussing themes regarding a free and independent media and academia. In recent years they have turned their attention towards uncovering corruption at Russian universities, as well as political persecution and state-promoted misinformation. DOXA has throughout 2022 worked especially on documenting the Russian invasion of Ukraine, students’ role in the Russian anti-war movement, freedom of expression, and changes in Russian academia under martial law. As a consequence of their support for students partaking in the opposition movement, many of the heads of the magazine have been expelled from the university, and several of the founders have experienced persecution, house arrest, and physical violence. Today, a majority of DOXA’s staff live in exile, and continue their work anonymously in order to keep the magazine alive. 

 

The Students’ Peace Prize is an initiative led by the International Student Festival at Trondheim (ISFiT), Norwegian Students’ and Academics’ International Assistance Fund (SAIH) and the Norwegian Student Association (NSO). The Peace Prize committee is composed of students, student representatives, and professional and political specialists in fields associated with peace, democracy, and human rights, and I was very lucky to take part in it this year. We experienced how difficult it was to discuss and arrive at only one winner between all the candidates, when each and every one of them deserved the highest degree of recognition. Still, DOXA Magazine rose above the rest of them. In a time when parts of the European continent are characterized by the forward march of authoritarianism, war, and uncertainty, the awarding of the Student Peace Prize highlights the true importance of the voices of students in the struggle for freedom of expression, while also recognizing the brave efforts of the students who risk their own wellbeing and safety for the cause.  

 

The announcement of this year’s Peace Prize winner took place in a jam-packed hall in Studentsamfundet in Trondheim on October 27th. Me and Jens (Head of the Student Parliament’s Board) were super lucky to be there. The announcement took place on a night with choir song, speeches from, among others, the rector Anne Borg, the leader of SAIH, Hector Ulloa, and the leader of NSO, Maika Godam, and a touching video from the winners themselves - many of whom still live in exile. The handing out of the prizes to the winners will take place in Trondheim during the ISFiT festival in February of 2023. The theme of the festival will, appropriately enough, be polarization.