The Nobel Peace Prize is the name of one of five Nobel Prizes bequeathed by the Swedish industrialist and inventor Alfred Nobel. Nobel died in 1896 and did not leave an explanation for his choice of this Nobel prize category. According to Nobel's will, the Peace Prize should be awarded "to the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between the nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses".

     The categories for chemistry and physics were obvious choices as he was a trained chemical engineer. The reason behind the peace prize is less clear. Some have said it was Nobel's way to compensate for developing destructive forces (Nobel's inventions included dynamite and ballistite). However, none of his explosives, except for ballistite, were used in any war during his lifetime.

     The Peace Prize is awarded annually in Oslo, the capital of Norway. The actual prize always is presented on the 10th of December, the anniversary of the death of Nobel. The Norwegian king is in attendance. For the past decade, the Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony at the Oslo City Hall has been followed the next day by the Nobel Peace Prize Concert, which is broadcast to over 150 countries and more than 450 million households around the world.

     The Norwegian Parliament appoints the Norwegian Nobel Committee, which selects the Laureate for the Peace Prize. The Committee chairman, currently Dr. Ole Danbolt Mjos, awards the Prize itself. At the time of Alfred Nobel's death Sweden and Norway were in a personal union in which the Swedish government was solely responsible for foreign policy, and the Norwegian Parliament was responsible only for Norwegian domestic policy. Alfred Nobel never explained why he wanted a Norwegian rather than Swedish body to award the Peace Prize. As a consequence, many people have speculated about Nobel's intentions. For instance, Nobel may have wanted to prevent the manipulation of the selection process by foreign powers, and as Norway did not have any foreign policy, the Norwegian government could not be influenced.

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