Harvard's Nobel Laureates in Peace

Founded in Boston in June of 1980 by four Harvard physicians, Bernard Lown of Harvard School of Public Health, and Herbert Abrams, Eric Chivian, and James Muller of Harvard Medical School, the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War is a federation of national groups dedicated to mobilizing the influence of the medical profession against the threat of nuclear weapons.

Bunche, the first African-American to be appointed to Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences, dedicated his life to issues of race and colonialism, and was a prominent figure in the early civil rights movement. His studies on race relations in the United States and colonialism in Africa brought him to the United Nations, where he was appointed to negotiate a cease-fire in the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. Upon hearing that he had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work in the Middle East, he respectfully declined the honor, claiming that he did not work in the UN Secretariat to win prizes; he was only doing his job. The Nobel committee gave it to him anyway, however, stating it was “for the good of the United Nations.”

Cadbury, AM ’04, Ph.D. ’14, was the Hollis Professor of Divinity and director of the Andover-Harvard Theological Library. A humanitarian, pacifist, biblical scholar, and prolific writer, Cadbury proposed the formation of the American Friends Service Committee – a Quaker relief organization – in order to spearhead relief activities in Europe after World War I. Under Cadbury’s leadership, the AFSC became involved with black schools in the South, in settlement houses, and in depressed areas of Appalachia. In 1931, at the request of President Herbert Hoover, the Service Committee fed children of coal miners. A pacifist organization, the AFSC was organized to offer Quakers and young conscientious objectors “a service of love in wartime.”