International Judicial Monitor
Published by the International Judicial Academy, Washington, D.C., with assistance from the
American Society of International Law

Winter 2011 Issue
 

Leading Figures in International Law

 

Dag Hammarskjold (1905 - 1961)

Dag Hammarskjold

By: Taylor G. Stout, Reporter, International Judicial Monitor

Dag Hammarskjold was a Swedish statesman, economist, diplomat, and author.  He is renowned for his work in Swedish financial affairs, Swedish foreign relations, and global international relations.  He served as the second Secretary-General of the United Nations, and he received the Nobel Peace Prize for his peace negotiations in many troubled regions around the world.  He died in a tragic plane crash on September 18, 1961.

Early Life

Hammarskjold was born on July 29, 1905 to Hjalmar and Agnes Hammarskjold.  He was the youngest of four brothers born to the Hammarskjolds.  Hjalmar Hammarskjold was the Prime Minister of Sweden from 1914 to 1918, and he also served as a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague, Governor of Uppland, and Chairman of the Board of the Nobel Foundation.

Hammarskjold studied at Uppsala University, where he earned a degree in the humanities in 1925.  By all accounts he was a brilliant student, and he earned a second degree from Uppsala University in economics in 1928, followed by a law degree in 1930 and a doctorate in economics in 1934.  In addition to his studies, Hammarskjold also pursued a variety of intellectual interests.  He had a passion for poetry, art, classical music, and Christian theology. 

Early Career and Domestic Public Service

Hammarskjold taught economics at the University of Stockholm for one year beginning in 1933, but he soon left academia to enter public service.  His first public post was that of secretary to a government commission on unemployment from 1930 to 1934.  His success in this capacity garnered him the attention of the directors of the Bank of Sweden, the most influential financial institution in Sweden.  They hired him as the bank’s secretary in 1935.  In 1936, Hammarskjold moved to the Swedish Ministry of Finance, where he served as undersecretary from 1936 to 1945.  In addition, he served concurrently as chairman of the Bank of Sweden from 1941 to 1948. 

Financial and economic policy was Hammarskjold’s primary intellectual and professional interest, and he proved influential in that arena.  In collaboration with his brother Bo, who was undersecretary in the Ministry of Social Welfare, he drafted legislation that helped create the modern welfare state in Sweden.  Hammarskjold’s star rose further as a result of the financial negotiations he conducted with Great Britain on the postwar economic reconstruction of Europe, for which he earned international acclaim.  He also took part in the organization of the Marshall Plan, spearheaded the renegotiation of trade agreements between Sweden and the United States, and helped lead the Executive Committee for European Economic Cooperation. 

Hammarskjold’s initial work with the Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs was as its financial advisor.  He began advising the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in this capacity in 1946, while still serving as chairman of the Bank of Sweden.  Despite his refusal to join any political party, he was named to an official post in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1949 and was elevated to deputy foreign minister in 1951, a cabinet post.  As deputy foreign minister, Hammarskjold focused on international economic cooperation, and he proved instrumental in Sweden’s involvement in the Council of Europe and the Organization of European Economic Cooperation.  He also advised Sweden not to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

Secretary-General of the United Nations and International Diplomatic Legacy

Hammarskjold first served as a Swedish delegate to the United Nations in 1949, and he did so again from 1951 to 1953.  In 1953, he was elected Secretary-General of the United Nations by a nearly unanimous vote.  He was reelected in 1957.  He completed his first noteworthy achievement as Secretary-General in 1955, when he personally negotiated the release of American soldiers captured by the Chinese during the Korean War.  He also conducted negotiations in the Middle East, particularly during the Suez Canal crisis in 1956.  In response to Nasser’s taking over the Canal, Hammarskjold personally negotiated with Britain, France, and Israel to end hostilities.  He also commissioned the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) to keep order.  The UNEF was the first peacekeeping force ever deployed by an international organization.

In addition to helping defuse the Suez Canal crisis, Hammarskjold established both the UN Observation Group in Lebanon and the UN Office in Jordan, which prompted the United States and Britain to withdraw the troops they had stationed in those countries.  And when problems arose in Cambodia, Thailand, and Laos in 1959, he sent envoys to begin negotiations in Southeast Asia. 

Hammarskjold’s tenure as Secretary-General of the United Nations saw a wave of developing nations achieve independence from colonial powers, and his later work dealt largely with these new nations.  Perhaps the most troublesome of these new nations was the newly independent Congo.  In 1960, the government of the recently liberated Congo faced the secession of the nation’s Katanga province, a mutinous military, and the interference of the Belgian military.  The Congolese government asked the United Nations for help, and Hammarskjold responded by personally leading a UN peacekeeping force to the Congo.  The conflict proved extremely volatile and plagued Hammarskjold’s final year as Secretary-General.  On September 18, 1961, upon learning that fighting had broken out between Katanga soldiers and the UN peacekeeping force, he flew to negotiate a ceasefire with President Tshombe of Katanga.  His plane never made it.  It crashed near the border of Katanga and North Rhodesia.  Hammarskjold and fifteen others perished. 

Nobel Prize and Influence

Shortly after his death, Hammarskjold received the 1961 Nobel Peace Prize.  He had been nominated for the award before his death.  He remains the only person ever to receive the Nobel Peace Prize posthumously, and he is the only Secretary-General of the United Nations to have died in office. 

Hammarskjold’s influence on the office of Secretary-General of the United Nations was profound.  His leadership was marked by a philosophy of preventive diplomacy, and he employed this tactic in conflicts on three separate continents during his tenure.  He also exercised his personal influence and diplomacy, setting the precedent for the Secretary-General of the United Nations to act in an independent, executive capacity in negotiating peace.  Finally, his establishment of the UNEF peacekeeping force marked the beginning of the UN practice of maintaining a UN presence in trouble spots around the world.  As a result of his tireless efforts to promote peace around the world and because of his legacy of shaping the office of Secretary-General of the United Nations, many scholars consider Hammarskjold the greatest Secretary-General in the history of the UN, and he will surely be remembered as one of the greatest statesmen of the twentieth century.    

Sources:

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/1961/hammarskjold-bio.html

http://www.un.org/Overview/SG/sg2bio.html

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/COLDhammarskjold.htm

http://www.uic.edu/depts/quic/history/dag_hammerskjold.html

 

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© 2011 – The International Judicial Academy
with assistance from the American Society of International Law.

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