3 CONFERENCES AT PRAGUE AND BERGEN AND THE LOOMING WAR 275international outlook, attendance at the event greatly exceeded expecta-
tions both in terms of number of delegates present as well in terms of the
wide range of countries that were represented. The conference boasted an
attendance list which, leaving aside its Norwegian hosts, included dele-
gates from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile,
Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, India, New Zealand, Poland,
Sweden, Turkey, India, Sweden, Switzerland and the United States.^117
Nonetheless, the international situation meant that many prospective
participants had been unable to or felt that they were not in a position
to make the journey to Bergen. Unsurprisingly, neither Berber nor any
other German nationals were present. Suprisingly perhaps, there was
no representative of the BCCIS present. Breaking news of events on
the continent prompted some among those who managed to make the
journey to ask themselves if it might not be advisable to return home.
Indeed, there was much discussion into the evening of August 27 at a
reception at the Hotel Terminus, as to whether or not the conference
should be abandoned altogether.^118 In the end, the delegates decided
that the conference should take place, although they also decided that
the study meetings, which were originally scheduled to conclude on
September 2, should conclude on the evening of August 29 and that
both the opening and closing meetings should be cancelled.^119
(^117) Note that the final act of the first Conference of the American National Committees
of Intellectual Cooperation, which took place in Santiago from January 6–12, 1939,
resolved that American National Committees should ‘collaborate most actively’ in the work
of the ISC. ‘Comité exécutif et comité du programme de la Conférence permanente des
hautes études internationales,’ Coopération Intellectuelle, nos. 99–100 (1939): 783–87,
785–86.
(^118) International Studies Conference, Twelfth Session, Economic Policies in Relation to
World Peace: A Record of the Study Meetings Held in Bergen from August 26 to 29, 1939
(Paris: International Institute of Intellectual Co-operation, League of Nations, April 1940),
vii, 9. IICI/9/23, UA.
(^119) The Indian delegate, Sir Brojendra al Mitter, who was the advocate-general of
India, had been due to reply on behalf of the conference to the formal address of wel-
come. Instead, he gave a brief address to the conference and then departed. Leo Gross to
Dr. Edvard Hambro, 3 July 1939, AG 1-IICI-K-I-25.b, UA. On the original dates of the
Bergen conference see Coopération Intellectuelle, nos. 99–100 (1939), 783. For the actual
dates of the conference at Bergen and the schedule of meetings held there see League of
Nations, International Studies Conference, Twelfth Session, Economic Policies in Relation
to World Peace: A Record of the Study Meetings Held in Bergen from August 26 to 29,
1939, 92, IICI/9/23, UA. As many of the conference participants were already pres-
ent in Bergen on August 26, a programme committee meeting was held on the morning