Graduated armament before general armament
General armament for the police is on the agenda in the Storting. Norwegian society is one of the safest in the world, and it seem unnecessary. First there should be discussed if all police assignments needs graduated armament.
March 31, 2025
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The Storting will vote on general armament
The Progress Party has put forward a proposal for general armament, to be considered in the Storting (Norwegian Parliament) on 15 May. The Centre Party's national convention came out in favor of general armament over the weekend, giving the Progress Party, the Conservatives, the Centre Party and the Christian Democrats a majority in the Storting.
Labour will decide its position at its national convention in April. Red, the Liberals and the Socialist Left are against general armament.
Police armament in Europe
Iceland is now set to become the only country in Europe with an unarmed police force. Iceland also has no standing army; it is a member of NATO and has a bilateral defence agreement with the United States dating from 1951. It does, however, have an armed national security police unit established in 2016.
Norwegian police are among the most highly educated police forces in the world, which is also one of the arguments for general armament. The question is whether we ought to have a graduated police force.
Although most European countries have general armament, some countries have adopted different solutions. In the United Kingdom and Ireland the police are not generally armed, but they have armed units, called Special Tactics & Operations Command and Police Armed Response Unit respectively. These countries also have several educational tracks; shorter vocational training qualifies officers for positions in areas such as traffic and public order duties.
Both graduated police training and armament should be considered
Norwegian authorities have had an excessive focus on higher education, which has not only driven public costs up but has also left us with a very low number of vocationally trained workers. Samfunn og Politikk examined this topic in the article Link between few vocationally trained workers and unemployment.
A graduated police force ought to be sufficient in Norway. We need to see more police on the streets and in traffic, and there ought to be a separate vocational training track for this. There are probably also other tasks within the police that do not necessarily require a university-level education or armament.
SOURCES
The Norwegian Police Federation
Armed policeGovernment of Iceland
National security policeAn Garda Síochána, Ireland
Special Tactics & Operations CommandElite UK Forces
Police Armed Response Unit
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