Norway truth commission details country's dark history of assimilation

In an ornate assembly hall of the Storting, Norway's parliament, Dagfinn Hoybraten, chair of the country's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, presented his work of the last five years.

"The truth is, Norway does not have a history to be proud of when it comes to the treatment of its minorities," he said Thursday.

Before national media and dignitaries from Norway's minority groups, Hoybraten formally tabled the commission's final report, detailing the impacts of a "comprehensive assimilation policy" — known as Norwegianization — which pursued "the fastest possible linguistic and cultural assimilation" of Indigenous and Finnish-descended minorities over more than a century.

"This dark side of Norwegian history has continued to cast shadows into our own time," Hoybraten said. "It is now time for a settlement regarding the nation's injustice."

Norway's commission took direct inspiration from Canada's process, with members visiting the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation in Winnipeg to study how the commission operated.

The Norwegian commission's work has not been without controversy. Before the publication of the final report, several groups expressed concerns that the commission was too secretive about its work, and feared its recommendations would lack real teeth.

Yet community leaders present at Thursday's ceremony generally voiced cautious optimism about the 700-page final report. "I'm very excited," said Kai Petter Johansen, leader of the Norwegian Kven Association, a linguistic minority group. 

"I think that it is promising," said Runar Myrnes Balto, a member of the governing council of Norway's Samediggi or Sami Parliament. "I think it's important now that the parliament, quickly, invites us to a meeting, to talk about the best possible way to take the next steps."

Launched in 2018, the commission is one of several underway across the Nordic countries, all of which are home to Indigenous Sami people.

The Sami are Europe's only recognized Indigenous group, occupying a broad swathe of Arctic territory spanning from Norway to Russia. Norway is home to their largest community, comprising around 65,000 people.

Early on, Norway's commission courted controversy by adopting a mandate that did not focus solely on Indigenous issues, instead studying the impacts of Norwegianization on all of the country's linguistic minorities.

That includes the Sami alongside Kven and Skog Finnish or Forest Finns, groups of Finnish origin who settled territory across northern and central Norway while retaining distinct languages and cultural practices.

"I think that was a failure from the very start," said Aslat Holmberg, president of the Saami Council, a transnational council that represents Sami in all the Nordic countries. "Of course, they have also experienced this Norwegianization. But at the same time, they are also settlers."

The report acknowledges that Kven were among the earliest colonizers of the north, asserting themselves in northern Norway as early as the 1700s with the explicit support of the Norwegian Crown.