Hereinafter war between Scandinavian brothers is impossible

These famous words were spoken by King Oscar I at the students’ ball at Drottningholm Palace in connection with the Nordic students’ meeting in Uppsala in 1856. Whether this statement was a spontaneous expression of the students’ Nordic spirit or a carefully planned shift in the official foreign policy remains unclear. Nevertheless it proves that a close cooperation across borders among students can lead to stronger relations between countries. 

The start of a close Nordic cooperation had been in the works since the 1820s between Lund and Copenhagen, where cooperative relationships were established between both professors and students. In 1839 a great amount of Swedish students arrived in the Danish capital, where many toasts for «The Nordic Trinity» were given. In 1843 many students from both Lund and Copenhagen took the trip to Uppsala. Two years later the time was ripe for a students’ meeting with representatives from the three Scandinavian countries, including the relatively new University of Oslo. All of them were also represented at the later famous meeting in Uppsala in 1856. 

Student meetings between Nordic students were held sporadically over the latter part of the 1800s. The law students were especially active in this regard, partly due to the legislative cooperation between the countries. In 1872 the first Nordic meeting between (graduated) lawyers was held, which gave impulses to the harmonization of the Nordic countries’ legislation. One can assume that lawyers who experienced the previous students’ meetings were also present at the lawyers’ meeting. But this is like speculating about the famous question about the hen and the egg. Nevertheless law students were among the most active, and this provided the springboard for an active tradition among law students’ organizations. 

Law students’ events

As several law students’ associations were founded around the Nordic countries, they started to organize big events for law students. And from the beginning of the 1900s it was arranged several of these events with both professors as guest speakers and students who were all ears from different Nordic countries. The first proper event was arranged in Copenhagen in 1918. There Juridisk Diskussionsklub held a Nordic Law Students’ event that lasted for a whole month with, among others, 60 Norwegian participants who «needed some time to recuperate after the demanding festivities». 

In 1926 Juridiska föreningen i Stockholm arranged a ten-day event with 193 participants – 153 from Stockholm and 40 guests from Lund, Uppsala, Norway, Denmark and Finland. The event continued for a couple of more days in Uppsala. In this way the participants avoided additional travel costs. The following year it was once again Juridisk Diskussionsklub who arranged the event in Copenhagen. In 1930 Juristforeningen invited students to Breidablikk in Valdres to the first proper law students’ event in Norway. The association in Oslo had arranged a few Nordic law students’ meetings before, but not of such a scale. 120 Scandinavians took the trip to the valley. Three years later a meeting was arranged in Helsinki, and for the first time all the Nordic nations were represented when four Icelandic law students took the trip for the first time.

In 1936 it was time for an event in Sigtuna, Sweden, with 50 guests, including professors from Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland. This was the beginning of what we today know as Culpa Cup, the Nordic football tournament that is sometimes more, sometimes less serious. Oslo emerged victorious and became the first possessor of the coveted champions’ trophy. At this event the Danes in Juridisk Diskussionsklub brought with them their pride, their student paper: Stud.Jur. And it didn’t take long after returning home before it was decided to begin the same tradition in Oslo. At the event in Sigtuna it was suggested that annual events should be arranged around the Nordic countries. Juristforeningen took upon itself to arrange it the year thereafter in Oslo, although it wasn’t arranged until 1939. And then something happened that prevented everything from starting properly: World War II. During the war Swedish and Finnish law students’ associations tried to keep part of the cooperation going. Understandably it was a bit more difficult for others. In 1947 it was time for the first law students’ event after the war, and the venues were Oslo and Lillehammer. After the law students’ event in Helsinki in 1950, it was time for the first event in Iceland three years after, in Reykjavik, and the Nordic guests got their first introduction to the Golden Circle. After that it was Lund’s turn in 1955, after which it was time to return to Oslo and a mountain hotel in Lillehammer in 1960, from where «60 foreign guests returned home as amazed ambassadors for Norway» after 14 days of presentations and festivities.

At an event in Reykjavik in 1964 there was discussion about formalizing the Nordic cooperation. Later that year the Nordiska Studentjuristrådet (NSJR) was established at an event on Helsinki. This was a cooperative organization between Oslo, Copenhagen, Aarhus, Reykjavik, Lund, Stockholm, Uppsala, Codex, Pykälä and Lex, that had annual meetings. The organization got its first statutes at a meeting in Stockholm the following year. Nordiska Studentjuristrådet would be a part of strengthening the Nordic cooperation for several years, but eventually became obsolete since a new, closer cooperation was about to take its place

Ball after Ball

While law students’ events were arranged roughly every second year following World War II, another form of cooperation emerged between several law students’ associations. The Swedish associations in Uppsala, Stockholm and Lund had already for some time invited each other to their annual balls, and now intended to make the tradition more Nordic. Codex took the trip to Uppsala and Stockholm, and Pykälä followed soon after. Oslo and Copenhagen were also early with a similar cooperation together with Stockholm and Codex. Already in 1946 representatives from several of the Nordic associations were invited to Staldthinget, Oslo’s annual ball held only every third year. Norwegian, Swedish, Danish and Finnish guests arrived traveling great distances to participate in the festivities in Oslo. The only problem was money, or rather the lack of it. Which is why the expansion of the cooperation proceeded at a much slower pace than was hoped for, but in the middle of the 1950s all the aforementioned associations participated at each other’s annual balls. And soon also Juridisk Selskab i Aarhus, Orator and Lex joined the annual ball exchange. JUS from the end of the 1950s, Orator starting around 1960 – they had their first ball with Nordic guests in 1961, and Lex from its founding in 1961. The fact that everyone else invited each other to the annual ball each year, while Oslo did so only every three years, was one of the reasons Hoppeballet was brought back from forgotten times and arranged in the fall of 1959.

It was in the 1950s the cooperation evolved into the Nordic Week we know today. With a foundation in all the Nordic law faculties it developed into a tradition where the associations invited each other to their annual balls. Because it was a lot of fun, and a ball night flies by, the visits were gradually developed into mini-weeks. In 1962 the idea of expanding the Nordic Week to get more people to participate was thought up. Up to this point the participants consisted of one or two members from the associations’ boards, but now more people would be allowed to participate. Codex was first in inviting around 30-35 guests, and only a few of them members of the boards, to four days of festivities the year after. And soon others followed suit. The weeks expanded further, with both subject matter and social events. Codex became famous in 1971 for organizing the K-supé, also known as the shortest party in the world. And Codex was one of the first ones to arrange a proper mini-week in the manner we know today. During the 70s and 80s the other weeks around the Nordic countries also became mini-weeks lasting five days, with a great mix of subject matter events and parties.

A little souvenir

A tradition involving taking souvenirs from other associations also evolved. And a lot of possessions have been moved around the Nordic countries; for example the door from Uppsala that took two trips with the Finnish ferry. Hennes Majestet Den gulblakke Hoppe, Oslo’s high protector , was taken away by some Swedes, but vengeance came when Fru Justitia, Stockholm’s high protector spent five years in «exile and prostitution» in Oslo. Grágás, the goose of Orator and Iceland, flew over to Norway, where it was ring-marked. Bergen’s Qa Injuria took a trip over the mountains to the capital. Not to mention all the signs that decorates all the associations’ club houses. After a while it became mandatory to pack a screwdriver for each Nordic Week. 

This tradition became regulated through statutes in a souvenir agreement in 1998. The background for the Souvenir Agreement were well described in a suggestion to amend the agreement in 2001: «Throughout history, student associations have ”borrowed” property from each other at joint events, so called sittnings, balls and similar antics. This tradition is deeply rooted and widespread in the Nordic universities. This is a characteristic that separates a university student from a college student, and universities from colleges. As a secretariat for law students’ associations in Scandinavia we hope to carry on this tradition in an orderly manner. All this to avoid future unfriendliness.»

The Souvenir Agreement has unfortunately been exceeded at several occasions, and against this background Lund exited the agreement in 2003. The year after Stockholm and Gothenburg followed suit, and in 2006 Uppsala exited the Souvenir Agreement. Since all the Swedish associations were no longer a part of the agreement, this led to the applicable agreement (updated in 2002) being declared void at the int.sek.-meeting in 2007 starting at the end of the Pykälä week and that a new one would be established. «The Associations’ Souvenir Agreement» is currently applied, and is per January 1st 2008 signed by Oslo, Bergen, Orator, Artikla and Pykälä.

Nordiska sekretariatet

Nordiska sekretariatet was formed at a meeting in September 1991 in connection with Juristforeningens HumAk in Oslo. The associations that participated in the organizing of this Nordic cooperation were Juristforeningen (Oslo), Juristforeningen i Bergen, Juristforeningen i Tromsø, Juridisk Diskussionsklub (Copenhagen), Juridisk Selskab (Aarhus), Juridiska föreningen i Göteborg, Juridiska föreningen i Lund, Juridiska föreningen i Stockholm, Juridiska föreningen i Uppsala and Juristklubben Codex r.f. (Helsinki). Sofia Johansson from Lund was the first President, and would lead Sekretariatet until the first proper int.sek.-meeting in Lund on April 22nd 1992. And to quote the minutes of this meeting: «All were in agreement that Sekretariatet was a very good idea». Here it was also pointed out that it was very positive that all international secretaries met and got to know each other, so that they would be more motivated to arrange a week of their own and to send people to other weeks. During 1992 Orator (Reykjavik) joined the cooperation. In 1993 Pykälä ry (Helsinki) and Lex ry (Turku) joined the secretariat, and the year thereafter Artikla ry (Rovaniemi). These three Finnish associations didn’t become full members until the int.sek.-meeting in 1995 in Stockholm for technical reasons. All 14 law students’ associations in the Nordic countries where law could be studied fully were now members of Nordiska sekretariatet. After Tromsø did not arrange weeks or attend meetings for three years in a row, they were expelled in 2001. Three years after that they joined again, but after failing to arrange a week after the ones in 2004 and 2005 they left the cooperation in 2007, due to a lack of commitment. The same year Lund also exited citing the apparent alcohol-oriented direction the weeks had taken as a reason. In Gothenburg they didn’t recruit any new nordists, and the association arranged their last Nordic Week in 2009. That year the board of Juridisk Diskussionsklub took charge of the arrangement from the hands of the nordists of Copenhagen, and tried to arrange something different than the traditional Nordic Weeks. It ended after two tries, in 2009 and 2010. As some goes out, some fortunately comes in. Sekretariatet gained their newest member when Justus r.f. from Vaasa was accepted at the int.sek.-meeting in Oslo in 2010, arranged their first Nordic Week in 2011, and was admitted as a full-fledged member at the int.sek.-meeting in Aarhus in 2013. In 2022 Uppsala regrettably voted to leave the association. There are currently 10 members of Nordiska sekretariatet, and therefore 10 Nordic Weeks are arranged each year. It is the sincere wish of Sekretariatet that the associations that have exited hopefully will rejoin soon, and that other, new members, also find their way to the world’s best cooperation!

Long live the Nordic cooperation!

Original text by Aksel Bjørnvall (President ofNordiska sekretariatet  2007-2008)

Translated and edited by Aksel Bjørnvall and Jaakko Laitinen (President of Nordiska sekretariatet  2014)

Updated by Gaukur Steinn Guðmundsson (President of Nordiska Sekretariatet 2024)