Laureate Effect: Will a Nobel Prize In Obama's Hand Help or Hurt the Climate Bill Cause?

Is a president with a Nobel peace prize in hand, more effective than one without? More specifically, will President Obama’s Nobel laureate status be a shot in the arm or a hindrance in the political battle to pass climate change legislation aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions?

In case you hadn’t heard, the Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded President Obama the Nobel Peace Prize early this morning — news that caught many, including the president and his White House staff, by surprise.

The committee pointed to Obama’s “vision and work for a world without nuclear weapons,” as well as his commitment to multilateral diplomacy. The committee goes onto to say, “Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting.”

Obama was chosen from a list of 205 nominees — including 33 organizations — the highest number of nominations ever, according to the Nobel committee.

The Internet is bursting with commentary and questions including, why so fast? And the common followup, how the Nobel Peace Prize could be awarded to a president that has yet to achieve any nuclear disarmament or pass legislation to reduce greenhouse gases?

The deadline to nominate a peace prize candidate is Feb. 1, although the committee may “on occasion add further names to the list” before the nomination process is closed. This means Obama had been president for maybe a month, when he was nominated. 

That small fact may help (or not) folks grappling with why Obama was chosen in the first place. To the committee, its about intentions and leadership towards a goal, even if that goal has not been achieved.

The WSJ’s Environmental Capital blog tosses around that very “it’s a cultural thing” point. “Europeans, like the Nobel committee, put more weight on intentions. Americans tend to focus on achievements.”

For weeks, the doomsday word-on-the-street has been two-fold: the U.S. will not pass climate change legislation before the end of year, which will, in turn, put global climate talks in Copenhagen this December in peril.

And climate talks in Bangkok — considered a prelude to the Copenhagen summit — ended Friday with less than stellar reviews and no breakthroughs on major issues like emission cuts.

If the peace prize does anything, it places responsibility for the outcome in Copenhagen squarely on the new Nobel laureate’s shoulders.

Yvo De Boer, the UN’s top climate official, has already said he hoped Obama’s win would be “an encouragement for him to bring a strong commitment to Copenhagen,” the AFP reported.

In the wake of Obama’s award, expect the calls for greater commitment to get a little louder.