Norway: Lessons Learned from a Nation in Mourning

I go to meet Tore Bjorgo at his home in Asker, not far outside Oslo. Bjorgo’s been studying Norwegian right-wing extremism for decades. He’s been instrumental in creating “exit programs” for youth who feel they are trapped in extremist groups. The method has been so successful that it has been exported to other European countries.

The trip to Bjorgo’s house is, for me, a great break for two reasons. First, I get out of Oslo for the first time since I arrived on Tuesday. Seeing the surrounding sea, forest and mountains help me lose the heavy feeling I get when I’m near the Oslo Cathedral, which has become the focal point for the city’s grief. You can’t walk by the sea of flowers, teddy bears and condolence cards in front of the Cathedral without seeing many in tears.

The second break is more journalistic. Bjorgo’s been doing interviews almost non-stop since the attacks last Friday. His wife, he jokes, has become his administrative assistant. She goes through the hundreds of emails and phone calls, and selects the ones that Bjorgo should respond to. When Bjorgo calls me up, he says: “You’re one of the lucky ones. I’m interested in what you want to talk about.”

“But,” he says, “we’re leaving for vacation in three hours.”

So I’m in a taxi as quickly as possible, and 25 minutes later, Bjorgo and I are sitting on his back porch talking about Norway’s history in battling extremism, right and left and otherwise.

It’s a grim topic set amidst the most beautiful of surroundings, and it reminds me of all the things I fell in love with in Norway when I was here on a reporting trip a few years ago.

Bjorgo’s proud of the fact that his methods played a role in the decline in neo-Nazi group membership through the years. But when the conversation turns to Anders Behring Breivik, the man who admits committing the attacks, Bjorgo’s voice drops.

Here’s a man who did not act, as far as authorities can tell, as part of a group. Here’s a man who used the Internet to spread his views and plan his actions. Here’s a man who, perhaps alone, managed to cause the biggest single loss of life in Norway since World War II.

“Our methods of the 1990s do not quite work,” Bjorgo says softly. “We have to find other ways to prevent that. This is in a different league compared to what we had in the past. Now we have to start to develop new knowledge, and that’s the task ahead.”

His wife sticks her head out of the door.

Bjorgo has to go in and do a Skype interview with a program in Canada. I get a tour of the garden, and a handful of fresh raspberries.

When Bjorgo comes back, he sits down heavily in his chair. “The segment before mine was something about football,” he says.

He tells me that he, like many Norwegians, is proud of the police response to the attacks in Oslo and Utoya. He expects that there will be tough questions asked of the police in the weeks and months ahead — questions that need to be asked, he emphasizes.

There are lessons to be learned, for sure, he says, but notes that any country who has suffered such an unexpected and devastating set of events would have lessons to learn.

What’s clear is that Bjorgo is immensely proud of his country’s immediate response: introspection, and pledges for Norway to remain a free, open and tolerant society. That’s what the politicians have pledged, and it’s what the people are actively doing.

And that’s when he tears up.

He tells me did not cry for the first 24 hours, because he couldn’t take it all in. He remembers the Saturday morning following the attacks, when he and his wife bumped into Jens Stoltenberg, the Norwegian Prime Minister, outside a television studio.

Bjorgo’s wife told Stoltenberg that his government was handling things well.

The Prime Minister then asked Bjorgo’s wife for a hug.

And that’s the thing about Norway. Even in mourning, the country has a way of being beautiful and inspiring.