By 1948, the trials had far exceeded estimates for their original time frame. This chapter looks at the effects the growing distance from the occupation had on court practice and the broader administration of the trials. It highlights how the unexpectedly long duration of the trials confronted the Ministry of Justice and the Director of Public Prosecutions with two specific challenges: firstly, it emerged that verdicts had been handed down unevenly over time; secondly, broader attitudes towards the trials in civil society had by now changed perceptibly. At the same time, the authorities in charge of the trials had a number of reservations against changing their legal parameters, as they were concerned for their long-term legacy should they be softened. This fundamental tension, along with the decision not to prosecute a number of wartime crimes such as economic collaboration, defined the later stages of the trials.

Provides a critical evaluation of the state effort to confiscate ‘illicit profits’ from economic collaboration and black-market exploitation of public misery. The economic purge provides significant evidence for the practices of black-market traffic during and after the Occupation, for the extent of black-market trade, and for the impossibility of holding most offenders accountable because the traffic was so widespread and major offenders found ways to keep their activities and profits hidden from state investigation.

The Nuremberg trials largely focused on foreign forced labour brought to the Reich, and Norway was a large net receiver as well (whereas most other occupied countries were net suppliers). Therefore, the overall question guiding this chapter is why the nexus between excessive war profits and exploitation of forced labour was so weak during the Norwegian legal settlement. The answer takes account of the fact that the focus on exploitation of forced labour at Nuremberg and subsequent tribunals corresponded to norms inherent in international law (war crimes, crimes against humanity) whereas the Norwegian neglect followed from a strict framing of national law. Cases related to criminal commercial collaboration were pursued from the perspective of national treason. Because the Allies had agreed that each country should prosecute war crimes against its nationals, Norwegian jurisprudence was allowed to sustain its bias towards national treason. This meant that Norwegian businesses which had in various ways been involved in the Nazi slave labour program were never properly investigated for possible exploitation of foreign forced labour. Consequently, whereas German historiography has elaborated the nexus between forced labour and war profits, the Norwegian counterpart has not.