NHH will not be the same without him
It was with great sadness that we received the news of Victor Norman's passing.
Victor D. Norman came to NHH in 1971, with a master's degree from Yale and a doctorate from MIT. At the age of 28, he became professor of economics at NHH in 1975, and was, with a few years away, in that role until he retired in 2016. In the 1990s, he was a professor at what was then Agder University College for a couple of years. He was rector of NHH from 1999 to 2001 and Minister of Labour and Administration in the Bondevik II government 2001-2004.
Through his academic excellence, strong commitment and unwavering belief in the importance of applying his knowledge and expertise to current societal challenges, Victor Norman has left a great mark, both at NHH, nationally and internationally.
Victor has had a significant influence in the field of international trade. He contributed groundbreaking research and was among a small group of international economists who in the late 1970s developed what has been called new trade theory. In the scientific background for awarding the Nobel Prize in Economics to Professor Paul Krugman in 2008, the importance of new trade theory is highlighted, and it was emphasised that several economists developed similar theories in parallel, including Victor Norman.
In the 1980s and 90s, European integration was on the agenda. The EU's internal market was created, the Berlin wall fell, and Norway got the EEA Agreement. During this period, Victor contributed to influential, applied analyses of economic integration and industry clusters, and thus to the knowledge base for industrial policy in a time of change.
Victor Norman has written several textbooks and popular science books. His textbook A Small, Open Economy (in Norwegian) was first published in 1983, and is still on the curriculum at many educational institutions. The book Theory of International Trade, which he published together with Professor Avinash Dixit in 1980, has become an international classic in the field.
Victor Norman was a member of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences and Letters since 1994, and in 2009 he received the Fridtjof Nansen Award for Outstanding Research. In 1991, he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the Stockholm School of Economics.
Victor was an avid proponent of creating strong research communities. He was passionate not only about international economics, but also about relevant and applied research in general. Through several major projects, he showed a unique ability and willingness to develop the organisation and, not least, facilitate the development of younger researchers. With great generosity, he used his professional weight and his international network to help young researchers up and forward. He championed gender equality and women in academia, and saw early on the importance of building up good research environments with strong international roots.
Victor also saw early on the importance of forging ties between the business community and applied research. He was central to the establishment of the Centre for Applied Research (SAF, later SNF) at NHH.
Internationally, Victor enjoyed great respect. Among other things, he was a research fellow at the Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) and one of the initiators of the annual meeting place for researchers in the field of international trade, the European Research Workshop in International Trade (ERWIT), which has taken place annually since 1988. He was also a member of the editorial board of the influential journal Economic Policy for several periods. He arranged a number of conferences and seminars at NHH, with the participation of leading international researchers in the field.
Generations of NHH students know Victor as an eminent lecturer. He taught at all levels – bachelor, master and PhD, but he preferred to lecture to the large cohorts at bachelor level, so "everyone" knew Victor. Even complicated theory became exciting and relevant with Victor as lecturer. He showed great care for the students, and never said no to their requests. He received the NHH students’ honorary award, the Bronze Sponge, several times, the first time as early as 1973 and the last time in 2014, and he received NHH's Award for Excellence in Teaching in both 2006 and 2016. A clear sign of Victor's popularity was the broad mobilisation of NHH students to bring him back to NHH after a couple of years in Kristiansand in the 1990s. And when Victor gave his last lecture at NHH, the auditorium was packed, and present and former students had collected money for a gift that was presented to him to enormous applause.
Victor Norman is well known far beyond the ranks of NHH and economists. His strong social commitment and unique ability to apply professional insight to current social issues had many impacts.
Few, if any, Norwegian economists have conveyed professional insight to as many people as Victor. From the end of the 1970s until shortly before his death, he wrote almost 400 articles in Norwegian newspapers, especially in Dagens Næringsliv. He gave countless lectures, was a member of various boards in business, academia, cultural life and voluntary organisations, and chaired and participated in a number of influential public reports and expert committees both nationally and internationally, of great importance for the public debate, for politics and for the development of Norwegian society.
Victor was a fantastic communicator who was able to make even the most complicated questions and reasonings comprehensible and engaging, and he was rewarded with several awards for his communication skills and efforts. In 2011, he received NHH’s Award for Excellent Knowledge Dissemination, and in 2021 the Kverulant Prize at the Kåkånomics festival. Shortly before his death, an initiative was taken to establish the "Victor D. Norman Dissemination Award".
Victor was concerned that politics should be soundly based on economic insights. As minister, he chose what he believed to be the professionally correct, if not the most convenient, solutions. He will be remembered as the minister who, despite much opposition, managed to move as many as eight public directorates and authorities out of Oslo. Perhaps just as significant is his role in ensuring that Norway achieved a modern competition law in harmony with the EEA area in 2004.
But Victor's academic generosity, consideration for both students and colleagues, and ability and willingness to build strong academic environments, were at least as important as his sharp analyses and great commitment. He will be deeply missed.
Jan I. Haaland,
Linda Orvedal,
Øystein Thøgersen,
Karen Helene Ulltveit-Moe.