Rolf Ketil Bjørn (18 January 1938 – 24 November 2008) was a Norwegian businessperson and politician for the Socialist Left Party. Bjørn was born in

Kåfjord Municipality , , or is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Troms Counties of Norway, county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Olderdalen. Other notable villages include Løkvollen, Manndalen, Birtavarre, ...

as the son of director Rolf Bjørn (1906–2000) and housewife Mariane Malvik (1908–1993). He finished his secondary education in 1957, and eventually enrolled at the

Norwegian School of Management BI Norwegian Business School () is a Norwegian specialized university that provides education and conducts research primarily in the fields of business and economics, marketing, strategy, management, and administration. BI is organized as a self ...

. He worked in the private company ''Gustaf Aspelin'' from 1964 to 1962, and in the family business ''Ric Bjørn'' from 1964 to 1989. Despite his social background in the

petite bourgeoisie ''Petite bourgeoisie'' (, ; also anglicised as petty bourgeoisie) is a term that refers to a social class composed of small business owners, shopkeepers, small-scale merchants, semi- autonomous peasants, and artisans. They are named as s ...

, he became a member of left-wing political groups. For this, he earned the nickname "the red millionaire". From 1959 to 1964 he was a member of the secretariat of the

Young Communist League of Norway The Young Communist League of Norway (, NKU) was until April 2006 the youth league of Norges Kommunistiske Parti (NKP). The NKP declared on 1 April 2006 that the NKU was no longer its youth organization, and that all youths interested in joinin ...

, having chaired the local branch in

Tromsø Tromsø is a List of towns and cities in Norway, city in Tromsø Municipality in Troms county, Norway. The city is the administrative centre of the municipality as well as the administrative centre of Troms county. The city is located on the is ...

from 1952 to 1957. From 1966 he held local leadership in the Socialist People's Party, which later became the Socialist Left Party. He opposed Norwegian membership in the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...

and

NATO The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO ; , OTAN), also called the North Atlantic Alliance, is an intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental Transnationalism, transnational military alliance of 32 Member states of NATO, member s ...

. Nonetheless, he did favor cooperation with the social democratic Labour Party, both locally as well as in the national Red-Green Coalition. He was elected to serve on the

municipal council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, borough cou ...

Tromsø Municipality Tromsø Municipality is a List of municipalities of Norway, municipality in Troms county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the Tromsø (city), city of Tromsø. Other notable settlements in the municipality include the vi ...

in 1987. Halfway through the term, in

1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...

, he was elected to represent

Troms Troms (; ; ; ) is a Counties of Norway, county in northern Norway. It borders Finnmark county to the northeast and Nordland county in the southwest. Norrbotten Län in Sweden is located to the south and further southeast is a shorter border with ...

county in the

Norwegian Parliament The Storting ( ; ) is the supreme legislature of Norway, established in 1814 by the Constitution of Norway. It is located in Oslo. The unicameral parliament has 169 members and is elected every four years based on party-list proportional represe ...

. He was re-elected in

1993 The United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly of the United Nations designated 1993 as: * International Year for the World's Indigenous People The year 1993 in the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands had only 364 days, since its ...

for a second, but final term. After this he served more terms in the municipal council. He finally retired in 2007. Bjørn was married, and had three children. He died in November 2008, at the

University Hospital of North Norway The University Hospital of North Norway () or UNN is a hospital and health trust. UNN is a university hospital for the region which includes the counties of Nordland, Troms and Finnmark. It is part of the Northern Norway Regional Health Autho ...

, of cancer.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bjoern, Rolf Ketil 1938 births 2008 deaths People from Gáivuotna–Kåfjord Socialist Left Party (Norway) politicians Politicians from Tromsø 20th-century Norwegian businesspeople BI Norwegian Business School alumni Deaths from cancer in Norway Members of the Storting 1993–1997 Members of the Storting 1989–1993