Quotes about democracy (2106 quotes, page 6)

“Lenin’ s article of 1905, "Party Organization and Party Literature", was used for decades, and is still used, to justify ideologically the enslavement of the written word in Russia. It has been argued that it refers only to political literature, but this is not so: it relates to every kind of writing. It contains the words: "Down with non-partisan writers! Down with literary supermen! Literature must become part of the common cause of the proletariat, ‘ a cog and a screw’ of one single great Social Democratic mechanism set in motion by the entire politically conscious vanguard of the entire working class" (Works, vol. 10, p. 45). For the benefit of "hysterical intellectuals" who deplore this seemingly bureaucratic attitude, Lenin explains that there can be no mechanical levelling in the field of literature; there must be room for personal initiative, imagination, etc.; none the less, literary work must be part of the party’ s work and controlled by the party. This, of course, was written during the fight for "hourgeois democracy", on the assumption that Russia would in due course enjoy freedom of speech but that literary members of the party would have to display party-mindedness in their writings; as in other cases, the obligation would become general when the party controlled the apparatus of state coercion.”

Leszek Kolakowski (1927–2009) Philosopher, historian of ideas

pg. 515
Main Currents Of Marxism (1978), Three Volume edition, Volume II, The Golden Age

Imagination , Literature , Freedom , Fight

“Dissent is a legitimate and essential right in any democracy and modern politicians must accept this fact with tolerance. A sense of proportion — and a sense of humour — is a sign of strength, not a sign of weakness.”

Sting (1951) English musician

Joining with Amnesty International in condemning the Russian authorities’ treatment of Pussy Riot, a Russian punk rock protest band. "Sting condemns Russia's treatment of Pussy Riot musicians ahead of Moscow concert" Amnesty International (25 July 2012) http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/sting-condemns-russias-treatment-pussy-riot-musicians-ahead-moscow-concert-2012-07-25

Sense

“Specifically, in these days when brutal and murderous terrorism seeks to drive us apart, we must reiterate to ourselves – here, in the Knesset, in schools, in academia and in the halls of Torah study – that to be Jewish is democratic and democracy is Jewish. Only in this way can we know that brutal terrorism will not break us physically, or our spirit.”

Reuven Rivlin (1939) Israeli politician, 10th President of Israel

This bill strikes at Israel’s heart http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/nov/27/bill-israel-judaism-democracy-president-israel-jewishness-reuven-rivlin, 27 November 2014

School , Way , Study

“I will recall once more Russia's most recent history.
Above all, we should acknowledge that the collapse of the Soviet Union was a major geopolitical disaster of the century. As for the Russian nation, it became a genuine drama. Tens of millions of our co-citizens and compatriots found themselves outside Russian territory. Moreover, the epidemic of disintegration infected Russia itself.
Individual savings were depreciated, and old ideals destroyed. Many institutions were disbanded or reformed carelessly. Terrorist intervention and the Khasavyurt capitulation that followed damaged the country's integrity. Oligarchic groups — possessing absolute control over information channels — served exclusively their own corporate interests. Mass poverty began to be seen as the norm. And all this was happening against the backdrop of a dramatic economic downturn, unstable finances, and the paralysis of the social sphere.
Many thought or seemed to think at the time that our young democracy was not a continuation of Russian statehood, but its ultimate collapse, the prolonged agony of the Soviet system.
But they were mistaken.
That was precisely the period when the significant developments took place in Russia. Our society was generating not only the energy of self-preservation, but also the will for a new and free life.”

Vladimir Putin (1952) President of Russia, former Prime Minister

Kremlin RU, http://kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2005/04/25/2031_type70029type82912_87086.shtml (25 April 2005)
2000 - 2005

Life , History , Thinking , Time

“Democracy is the best revenge.”

Benazir Bhutto (1953–2007) 11th Prime Minister of Pakistan

As quoted by her son, in "Democracy is the best revenge: Bilawal Bhutto Zardari," in Times of India (30 December 2007) http://web.archive.org/20080102174719/timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Democracy_is_best_revenge_Bilawal_Bhutto_Zardari/articleshow/2662912.cms?

Revenge

“Athenian democracy was different from the much later American form, not only because it was the expression of a single city-state but because it was a direct [democracy], rather than a representative democracy. To us, looking backwards, it may seem imprudent to invite all citizens to vote on all major initiatives, but Solon was right to appreciate that no Athenian freeman could allow himself to be left out of anything.”

Thomas Cahill (1940) American scholar and writer

Source: Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea: Why the Greeks Matter (2003), Ch.IV The Politician and the Playwright: How to Rule

“In a democracy, a government’s policies are rarely questioned until the underlying assumptions that create them are questioned.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Father and Child Reunion (2001), p. 147.

Question

“Democracy brought to others through the barrel of a gun is not democracy.”

Tzvetan Todorov (1939–2017) Bulgarian historian, philosopher, structuralist literary critic, sociologist and essayist

Hope and Memory: Reflections on the Twentieth Century (2003)

“There's something wrong with democracy. If there weren't, it couldn't be overthrown by people like Makann, attacking it from within by democratic procedures. I don't think it's fundamentally unworkable. I think it just has a few of what engineers call bugs. It's not safe to run a defective machine till you learn the defects and remedy them.”

H. Beam Piper (1904–1964) American science fiction writer

Prince Simon Bentrik in Space Viking (1962-1963)

People , Thinking , Learning

“The bomb attack on the Grand Hotel early this morning was first and foremost an inhuman, undiscriminating attempt to massacre innocent unsuspecting men and women staying in Brighton for our Conservative Conference…But the bomb attack clearly signified more than this. It was an attempt not only to disrupt and terminate our Conference; It was an attempt to cripple Her Majesty's democratically-elected Government. That is the scale of the outrage in which we have all shared, and the fact that we are gathered here now—shocked, but composed and determined—is a sign not only that this attack has failed, but that all attempts to destroy democracy by terrorism will fail.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Speech to Conservative Party Conference (12 October 1984) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/105763
Second term as Prime Minister

Women , Men

“Plato is correct about democracy. It is essentially mob rule. And once the mob gets an idea into its collective head, it’s almost impossible to get it out, or modify it in any way. In an era of mass communication and irresponsible media, it can be a deadly characteristic.”

Jack McDevitt (1935) American novelist, Short story writer

Source: Academy Series - Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins, Odyssey (2006), Chapter 32 (p. 289)

Way , Communication , Idea

“Revolution or civil war is the only outcome of the present irreconcilable attitude of Australian political parties. The methods of "democracy," far from providing a means of solving the industrial problem, have proved entirely inadequate to the task. Political organization has been mistaken for political education; the party system has accentuated and added to our industrial difficulties. Democracy has done nothing to help society to unanimity, nothing to aid the individual to a sense of social function.”

Elton Mayo (1880–1949) Australian academic

Source: Democracy and freedom. 1919, p. 44; Cited in: Wood & Wood (2004, 78).

War , Education , Problem , Sense

“The accursed power which stands on Privilege
(And goes with Women, and Champagne and Bridge)
Broke — and Democracy resumed her reign:
(Which goes with Bridge, and Women and Champagne).”

Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) writer

"On a Great Election"
Hilaire Belloc (1925)

Women

“Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem is quite surprising. It shows that three very plausible and desirable features of a social decision mechanism are inconsistent with democracy: there is no “perfect” way to make social decisions. There is no perfect way to “aggregate” individual preferences to make one social preference. If we want to find a way to aggregate individual preferences to form social preferences, we will have to give up one of the properties of a social decision mechanism described in Arrow’s theorem.”

Hal Varian (1947) American economist

Hal R. Varian, Microeconomics: A Modern Approach, Chapter 33. Welfare, 2002

Way , Decision , Perfection

“Some observers compare elections in some countries with sports events, where people are but spectators. Moreover, elections must not be mere interludes for pushing a lever and then retreating to passivity, for democracy demands committed participation in the daily workings of society.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

United Nations General Assembly - Promotion of a democratic and equitable international order http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/IntOrder/A-68-284_en.pdf.
2013

People , Sport , Country

“There is no Episode VII…Not about Luke Skywalker, not about, you know, that group of people and that struggle to bring democracy back to the galaxy.”

George Lucas (1944) American film producer

Minutes Overtime: George Lucas (2005) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9W4Eew8WJoU60

People

“Democracy, voters, voting responsibility […] everyone in Vadodara […] the awakening of the voters was very important and I thank and congratulate them.”

Narendra Modi (1950) Prime Minister of India

2014, "Election results 2014 LIVE: Vadodara goes wild as hero Modi arrives", 2014

“In a modern democracy, not only can a libertarian be elitist; a libertarian has to be elitist. To be a libertarian in a modern democracy is to say that nearly 300 million Americans are wrong, and a handful of nay-sayers are right.”

Bryan Caplan (1971) American political scientist

Quoted in Elitism or Populism: Pick Your Poison http://econlog.econlib.org/archives/2006/11/elitism_or_popu.html, by Arnold Kling (November 12, 2006)

“A modern democracy is a tyranny whose borders are undefined; one discovers how far one can go only by traveling in a straight line until one is stopped.”

Norman Mailer book The Presidential Papers

Preface
The Presidential Papers (1963)

Travel

“It was our hope that Libya with its revolution would become a model of freedom, popular democracy and a state free from oppression and injustice. However Libya became another conventional state, even a dictatorial or police state. This is deeply regrettable. We are not like that, nor do we want to be like that.”

Muammar Gaddafi (1942–2011) Libyan revolutionary, politician and political theorist

Speech to heads of justice of the Jamahiriya (20 May 2009) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rM64DYglBk
Speeches

Hope , Freedom

“In so far as men have attempted to use the Old Testament as a code of model laws and institutions and have applied these to modern conditions, regardless of the historical connections, these attempts have left a trail of blunder and disaster. In so far as they have caught the spirit that burned in the hearts of the prophets and breathed in gentle humanity through the Mosaic Law, the influence of the Old Testament has been one of the great permanent forces making for democracy and social justice.”

Walter Rauschenbusch (1861–1918) United States Baptist theologian

Source: Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907), Ch.1 The Historical Roots of Christianity the Hebrew Prophets, p. 2

Men , Justice , Law , Heart

“So Sen is right that democracy can be pressed into the service of reducing injustice. Indeed this can happen against expectations. Had there been neoclassical economists around in the late eighteenth century, they would have scoffed at the possibility of abolishing the slave trade. In the absence of a system of multilateral enforcement, Britain had to bear the enormous expense unilaterally—over several decades—without any obvious prospect of a return. whether democracy fosters or hinders economic growth.”

Ian Shapiro (1956) American political theorist

Review of The Idea of Justice by Amartya Sen, Journal of Economic Literature (December 2011).

“Political democracy can remain if it confines itself to all but economic matters.”

Stuart Chase (1888–1985) American economist

The Economy of Abundance (1934), p. 313, as quoted in The Road to Serfdom (1944), p. 124.

“Bereft of much of its mummery, Marxist theory reveals itself as a variant of generic fascism. The contest of the twentieth century, which has cost so much in human lives, was not between the Right and the Left. It was between representative democracies and their anti-democratic opponents”

A. James Gregor (1929–2019) American political scientist

Source: The Faces of Janus: Marxism and Fascism in the Twentieth Century, (2000), p. x

“We must stand united in our support of other young democracies, from the people of Lebanon struggling to maintain their hard-won independence, to the people of the Palestinian Territories, who deserve a free and peaceful state of their own. We must stand united in our support of the people of Georgia. The United Nations Charter sets forth the equal rights of nations large and small. Russia's invasion of Georgia was a violation of those words. Young democracies around the world are watching to see how we respond to this test. The United States has worked with allies in multilateral institutions like the European Union and NATO to uphold Georgia's territorial integrity and provide humanitarian relief. And our nations will continue to support Georgia's democracy.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2008, Address to the United Nations General Assembly (September 2008)

People , World , Peace , Support

“The outcome of today's case will doubtless be heralded as a triumph of judicial statesmanship. It is not that, unless it is statesmanlike needlessly to prolong this Court's self-awarded sovereignty over a field where it has little proper business, since the answers to most of the cruel questions posed are political, and not juridical -- a sovereignty which therefore quite properly, but to the great damage of the Court, makes it the object of the sort of organized public pressure that political institutions in a democracy ought to receive. […] Ordinarily, speaking no more broadly than is absolutely required avoids throwing settled law into confusion; doing so today preserves a chaos that is evident to anyone who can read and count. Alone sufficient to justify a broad holding is the fact that our retaining control, through Roe, of what I believe to be, and many of our citizens recognize to be, a political issue, continuously distorts the public perception of the role of this Court. We can now look forward to at least another Term with carts full of mail from the public, and streets full of demonstrators, urging us -- their unelected and life-tenured judges who have been awarded those extraordinary, undemocratic characteristics precisely in order that we might follow the law despite the popular will -- to follow the popular will. Indeed, I expect we can look forward to even more of that than before, given our indecisive decision today. […] It was an arguable question today whether [Section] 188.029 of the Missouri law contravened this Court’s understanding of Roe v. Wade, and I would have examined Roe rather than examining the contravention. […] Of the four courses we might have chosen today -- to reaffirm Roe, to overrule it explicitly, to overrule it sub silentio, or to avoid the question -- the last is the least responsible. On the question of the constitutionality of [Section] 188.029, I concur in the judgment of the Court and strongly dissent from the manner in which it has been reached.”

Antonin Scalia (1936–2016) former Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

Webster v. Reproductive Health Services (1989, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment), 492 U.S. 490 https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/492/490#writing-USSC_CR_0492_0490_ZC1, No. 88-605 ; decided July 3, 1989
1980s

Life , Law , Understanding , Question

“The miners' leaders have said more than once that they are confronting the Government, not the National Coal Board. I believe they may not yet have fully understood the implications of this approach. For it is just not the government—it is the expressed will of the elected representatives of the people in Parliament. That is the main difference between the dispute in 1972 and the dispute in 1973 and I believe that it will prove decisive. For the authority of the elected Parliament is the cornerstone of our democracy, and is recognized as such by the overwhelming majority of people in this country”

Edward Heath (1916–2005) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1970–1974)

Speech in Nelson, Lancashire (22 November 1973), quoted in The Times (23 November 1973), p. 2.
Prime Minister

People , Decision , Country

“Who had used the mysterious September 11 incident as a pretext to attack Afghanistan and Iraq, killing, injuring and displacing millions of people. Whose military spending exceeded $1,000 billion dollars annually — more than the military budgets of all countries in the world combined? Who dominated the policy-making establishments of the world’s economy, as well as the Security Council, which was ostensibly responsible for safeguarding international security? Do these arrogant Powers really have the competence and ability to run or govern the world? “Can the flower of democracy bloom from [North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s] missiles, bombs and guns?”

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (1956) 6th President of the Islamic Republic of Iran

2011

People , World , Flowers , Country

“If low-wage workers do not always behave in an economically rational way, that is, as free agents within a capitalist democracy, it is because they dwell in a place that is neither free nor in any way democratic. When you enter the low-wage workplace — and many of the medium-wage workplaces as well — you check your civil liberties at the door, leave America and all it supposedly stands for behind, and learn to zip your lips for the duration of the shift. The consequences of this routine surrender go beyond the issues of wages and poverty. We can hardly pride ourselves on being the world's preeminent democracy, after all, if large numbers of citizens spend half their waking hours in what amounts, in plain terms, to a dictatorship.”

Barbara Ehrenreich (1941) American writer and journalist

Evaluation (p. 210)
Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America (2001)

World , Way , Learning

“I dream of a time when the people will retake their airways and use them to achieve a voice to rediscover democracy, and to see the divine potential of man.”

Gerry Spence (1929) American lawyer

Source: Give Me Liberty! (1998), Ch. 20 : The Media : The Perpetual Voice of the Master, the Abiding Ear of the Slave, p. 243. Dream 7 : A Propaganda for People, Not Things

People , Dreams , Time

“Does Madison's belief that separation of powers is necessary to prevent tyranny necessarily require a presidential system or even judicial review? As I pointed out, this reading makes Madison silly, or at least a casualty of historical developments, since almost all other democratic countries have rejected the first and some the second. Of course, like all others of his time Madison had to make judgments about constitutional arrangements with very little directly relevant historical experience to go on. Hindsight gives us the advantage of nearly two centuries of later experience, during which most of the stable democracies adopted a parliamentary system, only a few chose a presidential system, and none adopted the American presidential system.”

Robert A. Dahl (1915–2014) American political scientist

Foreword : Reflections on A Preface to Democratic Theory
A Preface to Democratic Theory (Expanded ed., 2006)

Time , Reading , Country

“Lincoln sees American democracy as a last stand, what he calls the last, best hope. And if this goes down, we may so discredit the whole notion of democracy that no one will ever want to go this way again, and so this is the test. It’s a test of whether or not we’ll have this new birth of freedom, if we’ll finally shuck off these last husks of aristocracy and move forward in the direction of democracy. That for him is the vital issue.”

Allen C. Guelzo (1953) American historian

2010s, Interview with Tom Mackaman (2013)

Hope , Way , Birth , Freedom

“I have devoted half my fortune and most of my energies in the last 15 years to promoting the values of democracy and open society all over the world, especially in the former Soviet Empire. After 9/11 I came to feel that those principles need to be defended at home.”

George Soros (1930) Hungarian-American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist

Speech at the National Press Club (2004)

World , Feeling , Home

“Politics, under a democracy, reduces itself to a mere struggle for office by flatterers of the proletariat; even when a superior man prevails at that disgusting game he must prevail at the cost of his self-respect. Not many superior men make the attempt. The average great captain of the rabble, when he is not simply a weeper over irremediable wrongs, is a hypocrite so far gone that he is unconscious of his own hypocrisy—a slimy fellow, offensive to the nose.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

1940s–present, Introduction to Nietzsche's The Antichrist

Men , Game

“Our concepts of ballot-box democracy may need to be modified to produce strong governments capable of making difficult decisions.”

Maurice Strong (1929–2015) Canadian businessman

Source: "Facing Down Armageddon: Environment at a Crossroads," essay by Maurice Strong in World Policy Journal, Summer, 2009 "Successful management of today's traumatic processes of change will not be easy to achieve. Our concepts of ballot-box democracy may need to be modified to produce strong governments capable of making difficult decisions, particularly in terms of safeguarding the global environment that this transition will require and whose results are often not immediately apparent."

Decision , Strong , Box

“The Republican cause is onward. Every man who desires good government has an important political duty to perform, and, with a united and determined effort, the country will be redeemed from the misrule of modern Democracy.”

Elbridge G. Spaulding (1809–1897) American politician

Remarks on the Republican platform (1860)

Effort , Country

“Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.”

Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790) American author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, inventor, civic activist, …

Widely attributed to Franklin on the Internet, sometimes without the second sentence. It is not found in any of his known writings, and the word "lunch" is not known to have appeared anywhere in English literature until the 1820s, decades after his death. The phrasing itself has a very modern tone and the second sentence especially might not even be as old as the internet. Some of these observations are made in response to a query at Google Answers. http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=389308
The earliest known similar statements are:
A democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.
Gary Strand, Usenet group sci.environment, 23 April 1990. http://groups.google.com/group/sci.environment/msg/057b1c6389f4776f?dmode=source
Democracy is not freedom. Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch. Freedom comes from the recognition of certain rights which may not be taken, not even by a 99% vote.
Marvin Simkin, "Individual Rights", Los Angeles Times, 12 January 1992. http://articles.latimes.com/1992-01-12/local/me-358_1_jail-tax-individual-rights-san-diego
Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner.
James Bovard, Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty (1994), ISBN 0312123337, p. 333.
Also cited as by Bovard in the Sacramento Bee (1994) http://www.giraffe.com/gr_wolves.html
Misattributed
Variant: Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.

“The Roman historian Tacitus once said, that the health and the disease of a state can be measured in the number of its laws. If we Germans nowadays look at the huge number of laws, we have to say, that it's not health, but death that we're approaching. … It is strange that it is Social Democracy of all movements, which in the old state complained about exceptions, that now issues exception laws itself. These exception-laws are means of force and are created in the parliaments with the help of supranational financial powers. …
In the old state an interest rate of more than 6 percent was deemed usury. Today this usury is legalized. It was YOU, the men of the left -- who always pretend to fight against capitalism and exploitation -- who accomplished this. It will be your downfall!”

Julius Streicher (1885–1946) German politician

Der römische Geschichtsschreiber Tacitus hat einmal gesagt, dass man die Gesundheit und die Krankheit eines Staates nach der Zahl seiner Gesetze ermessen könne. Wenn wir Deutsche heute die große Zahl unserer Gesetze betrachten, dann müssen wir sagen, dass wir nicht der Gesundheit, sondern dem Tode entgegengehen. … Es ist sonderbar, dass ausgerechnet die Sozialdemokratie, die sich im alten Staat immer über Ausnahmen aufgeregt hat, jetzt selbst Ausnahmegesetze erläßt! Diese Ausnahmegesetze sind Zwangsmittel und werden in den Parlamenten mit Hilfe überstaatlicher Finanzmächte geschaffen. …
Im alten Staate galt ein Zinsfuß von mehr als 6 Prozent als Wucher. Heute ist dieser Wucher gesetzlich genehmigt. Das haben SIE, meine Herren von der Linken, die Sie immer vorgeben, Kapitalismus und Ausbeutung zu bekämpfen, fertiggebracht! Daran werden Sie zugrunde gehen!
04/20/1926, speech in the Bavarian regional parliament ("Kampf dem Weltfeind", Stürmer publishing house, Nuremberg, 1938)

Death , Men , Health , Disease

“I understand how strongly so many of my fellow veterans and citizens feel about the flag and I understand the powerful sentiment in state legislatures for such an amendment. I feel the same sense of outrage. But I step back from amending the Constitution to relieve that outrage. The First Amendment exists to insure that freedom of speech and expression applies not just to that with which we agree or disagree, but also that which we find outrageous. I would not amend that great shield of democracy to hammer a few miscreants. The flag will be flying proudly long after they have slunk away.”

Colin Powell (1937) Former U.S. Secretary of State and retired four-star general

1990s, Letter to Patrick Leahy (1999)

Feeling , Understanding , Sense , Freedom

“If the West is genuinely interested in democracy then they will have to suffer hundreds of Al Jazeeras. There is Abu Dhabi television, Al-Arabiya (but that is under Saudi patronage), and there is a channel out of Lebanon (but they are politically close to Hezbollah). They are all very good as journalists but they are all part of the state.”

Samir Khader Iraqi journalist

Suffering , Parting

“Liberal' comes from the Latin liberalis, which means pertaining to a free man. In politics, to be liberal is to want to extend democracy through change and reform. One can see why the word had to be erased from our political lexicon.”

Gore Vidal (1925–2012) American writer

"America First? America Last? America at Last?," Lowell Lecture, Harvard University (20 April 1992)
1990s

Change

“The institutions which our ancestors established to to sustain and defend democracy in this country are still with us today, more than two hundred years later.”

John Allen Fraser (1931) Canadian politician

Afterword, p. 172
The House Of Commons At Work (1993)

Country

“The most effective censorship is not, in fact, legal; in a democracy—as Tocqueville pointed out in Democracy in America—it is public opinion.”

Henry Steele Commager (1902–1998) American historian

Source: Freedom, Loyalty, Dissent (1954), p. 15

“In a democracy it is the duty of the state governments to ban cow slaughter. There are a lot of things to eat in this country apart from cow.”

Niranjan Jyoti (1967) Indian politician

As quoted in " Duty of state govts to ban cow slaughter, says Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti in Kolkata http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/duty-of-state-govts-to-ban-cow-slaughter-says-sadhvi-niranjan-jyoti-in-kolkata/" The Indian Express (23 November 2015)

Country

“Hoda Abdel Hamid (Interviewer for Al Jazeera): President Mathripala Sirisena, thank you for talking to Al Jazeera. Now you've been a year in power, you have received a lot of praise whether it is at home [Sri Lanka] or on the international level. Some go as far as saying 'Sri Lanka is finally on track to fix its democracy.”

Maithripala Sirisena (1951) Sri Lankan politician, 7th President of Sri Lanka

Looking at your second year, what other priorities?
Talk to Al Jazeera - Sri Lankan president: No allegations of war crimes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udGmG-eqJ6o

Home

“I think art has a right—not an obligation—to be difficult if it wishes. And, since people generally go on from this to talk about elitism versus democracy, I would add that genuinely difficult art is truly democratic.”

Geoffrey Hill (1932–2016) English poet and professor

Interview, The Paris Review No. 80, Spring 2000 http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/730/the-art-of-poetry-no-80-geoffrey-hill

People , Art , Thinking

“Nobody can rule innocently,' as Saint-Just puts it. And in totalitarianism, the Party becomes again the very subject who, being the immediate embodiment of the People can rule innocently. It is not by accident that the real-socialist countries call themselves 'people's democracies.”

Slavoj Žižek book The Sublime Object of Ideology

165
The Sublime Object of Ideology (1989)

People , Country

“We're adapted to the meta-reality, which means that we're adapted to that which remains constant across the longest spans of time. And that's not the same things that you see around you day to day. They're just like clouds, they're just evaporating, you know? There are things underneath that that are more fundamental realities, like the dominance hierarchy, like the tribe, like the danger outside of society, like the threat that other people pose to you, and the threat that you pose to yourself. Those are eternal realities, and we're adapted to those. That's our world, and that's why we express all those things in stories. Then you might say, well how do you adapt yourself to that world? The answer, and I believe this is a neurological answer, is that your brain can tell you when you're optimally situated between chaos and order. The way it tells you that is by producing the sense of engagement and meaning. Let's say that there's a place in the environment that you should be. So what should that place be? Well, you don't want to be terrified out of your skull. What good is that? And you don't want to be so comfortable that you might as well sleep. You want to be somewhere where you are kind of on firm ground with both of your feet, but you can take a step with one leg and test out new territory. Some of you who are exploratory and emotionally stable are going to go pretty far out there into the unexplored territory without destabilizing yourself. And some people are just going to put a toe in the chaos, and that's neuroticism basically - your sensitivity to threat that is calibrated differently in different people. And some people are more exploratory than others. That's extroversion and openness, and intelligence working together. Some people are going to tolerate more chaos in their mixture of chaos and order. Those are often liberals, by the way. They're more interested in novel chaos, and conservatives are more interested in the stabilization of the structures that already exist. Who's right? It depends on the situation. That's why liberals and conservatives have to talk to each other, because one of them isn't right and the other is wrong. Sometimes the liberals are right and sometimes the liberals are right, because the environment is unpredictable and constantly changing, so that's why you have to communicate. That's what a democracy does. It allows people of different temperamental types to communicate and to calibrate their societies. So let's say you're optimally balanced between chaos and order. What does that mean? Well, you're stable enough, but you're interested. A little novelty heightens your anxiety. It wakes you up a bit. That's the adventure part of it. But it also focuses the part of your brain that does exploratory activity, and that's associated with pleasure. That's the dopamine circuit. So if you're optimally balanced - and you know you're there if you're listening to an interesting conversation or you're engaged in one…you're saying some things that you know, and the other person is saying some things that they know - and what both of you know is changing. Music can model that. It provides you with multi-level predictable forms that can transform just the right amount. So music is a very representational art form. It says, 'this is what the universe is like.' There's a dancing element to it, repetitive, and then little variations that surprise you and produce excitement in you. In doesn't matter how nihilistic you are, music still infuses you with a sense of meaning because it models meaning. That's what it does. That's why we love it. And you can dance to it, which represents you putting yourself in harmony with these multiple layers of reality, and positioning yourself properly.”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

"The selection pressure that women placed on men developed the entire species. There's two things that happened. The men competed for competence, since the male hierarchy is a mechanism that pushes the best men to the top. The effect of that is multiplied by the fact that women who are hypergamous peel from the top. And so the males who are the most competent are much more likely to leave offspring, which seems to have driven cortical expansion."
Concepts

Love , Women , Men , People

“Journalism is one of the devices whereby industrial autocracy keeps its control over political democracy; it is the day-by-day, between-elections propaganda, whereby the minds of the people are kept in a state of acquiescence, so that when the crisis of an election comes, they go to the polls and cast their ballots for either one of the two candidates of their exploiters.”

Upton Sinclair book The Brass Check

The Brass Check (1919)

People

“We are already into the crisis. It will accelerate in the next five years. There will come a time in the next 10 years when it will be irrelevant which party comes to power. The word democracy will be irrelevant when people rush to grab whatever available resources are left.”

Maneka Gandhi (1956) Indian politician and activist

On global warming, as quoted in "Maneka Gandhi on India and global warming" http://www.rediff.com/money/2007/may/14guest1.htm, Rediff (14 May 2007)
2001-2010

People , Time

“We are neither for a majority nor for a minority government; neither for democracy not for dictatorship.
We are for the abolition of the gendarme. We are for the freedom of all and for free agreement, which will be there for all when no one has the means to force others, and all are involved in the good running of society. We are for anarchy.”

Errico Malatesta (1853–1932) Italian anarchist

Neither Democrats, Nor Dictators: Anarchists (1926)

Freedom

“…there had been many changes in the national ideals in this country during the past 50 years. … liberty, so far as it regarded political power, freedom of opinion, and freedom of action, was rather more in men's minds in the fifties as an essential element in the making of national happiness and well-being than it was in the present day. … Republicanism was then a thing much talked of in England. It was curious to note how completely that had gone, and the discovery made that the true enemy of liberty and democracy was not a monarchy, but money, and the power that money exerted.”

James Bryce, 1st Viscount Bryce (1838–1922) British academic, jurist, historian and Liberal politician

Speech to the Economic Students' Union at the School of Economics and Political Science, London (14 December 1900), quoted in The Times (17 December 1900), p. 13.
1900s

Men , Money , Freedom , Change

“When I was young I once found a book in a Dutch translation, The 'Leaves of Grass'. It was the first time a book touched me by its feeling of freedom and open spaces, the way the poet spoke of the ocean by describing a drop of water in his hand. Walt Whitman was offering the world an open hand (now we call it democracy) and my 'Monument for Walt Whitman' became this open hand with mirrors, so you can see inside yourself.”

Karel Appel (1921–2006) Dutch painter, sculptor, and poet

Source: Karel Appel – the complete sculptures,' (1990), p. 93 'Quotes', K. Appel (1989)
Appel's quote is referring to his sculpture 'Monument for Walt Whitman', dedicated to the American poet

Books , World , Way , Feeling

“Thus, as [Karl] Kautsky wrote in 1919, there was growing up amid despotic conditions a new class of bureaucratic German exploiters, no better than the Tsarist chinovniks; and the workers’ future struggle against tyranny would be even more desperate than under traditional capitalism, when they could exploit divergences of interest between capital and the state bureaucracy, whereas in Bolshevik Russia these two had coalesced into one. This kind of regimented socialism could only maintain itself by denying its own principles, which it was most likely to do, given the Bolsheviks’ notorious opportunism and the ease with which they changed their tune from one day to the next. The most probable result would be a kind of Thermidor reaction which the Russian workers would welcome as a liberation, like the French in 1794. The original sin of Bolshevism lay in the suppression of democracy, abolition of elections, and denial of the freedom of speech and assembly, and in the belief that socialism could be based on a minority despotism imposed by force, which by its own logic was bound to intensify the rule of terror. If the Leninists were able to keep their "Tartar socialism" going long enough, it would infallibly result in the bureaucratization and militarization of society and finally in the autocratic rule of a single individual.”

Leszek Kolakowski (1927–2009) Philosopher, historian of ideas

pg. 51
Main Currents Of Marxism (1978), Three Volume edition, Volume II, The Golden Age

Freedom , Change , Future

“At its 10th December Conference in Geneva the Future of Human Rights Forum endorsed new structures and mechanisms to advance the realization of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the General Assembly 65 years ago. Among important initiatives discussed by a high level panel was the creation of a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly aimed at empowering world citizens and giving them direct participation in the political processes that affect them. Democracy lives from consultation and participation and a United Nations Parliamentary Assembly can meaningfully advance this goal.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

2013 Future of Human Rights Forum http://dezayasalfred.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/2013-future-of-human-rights-forum/.
2013

World , Universe , Future

“Every profession has an ideology and a drive for power that goes far beyond its achievements and it is the task of democracy to keep this ideology and this drive under control. Science is here no different from other institutions.”

Paul Karl Feyerabend book Science in a Free Society

pg 151.
Science in a Free Society (1978)

Science

“If patriotism were defined, not as blind obedience to government, nor as submissive worship to flags and anthems, but rather as love of one's country, one's fellow citizens (all over the world), as loyalty to the principles of justice and democracy, then patriotism would require us to disobey our government, when it violated those principles.”

Howard Zinn (1922–2010) author and historian

Declarations of Independence: Cross-Examining American Ideology (1991): "Obligation to the State" http://www.ecn.cz/temelin/textonly/state_zin.htm

Love , World , Justice , Loyalty

“Today, our dominant international challenge is to restore the greatness of America, based on telling the truth, a commitment to peace, and respect for civil liberties at home and basic human rights around the world.
Truth is the foundation of our global leadership, but our credibility has been shattered and we are left increasingly isolated and vulnerable in a hostile world.
Without truth, without trust, America cannot flourish. Trust is at the very heart of our democracy, the sacred covenant between a president and the people.
When that trust is violated, the bonds that hold our republic together begin to weaken.”

Jimmy Carter (1924) American politician, 39th president of the United States (in office from 1977 to 1981)

Post-Presidency, DNC address (2004)

Hostility , People , Truth , World

“In this country and in other democracies, the enemies of civilisation and freedom have turned to the gun and the bomb to destroy those they can't persuade. The terrorist threat to freedom is worldwide. It can never be met by appeasement. Give in to the terrorist and you breed more terrorism. At home and abroad our message is the same. We will not bargain, nor compromise, nor bend the knee to terrorists.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Speech to Conservative Party Conference (14 October 1988) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/speeches/displaydocument.asp?docid=107352
Third term as Prime Minister

Home , Freedom , Country

“Democracy cannot consist solely of elections that are nearly always fictitious and managed by rich landowners and professional politicians.”

Ernesto Che Guevara (1928–1967) Argentine Marxist revolutionary

On Growth and Imperialism (1961)

“Direct, participatory and responsive democracy has been shown to be conducive to achieving a more just world order. Only such an approach will allow progressing from predator societies to human rights oriented societies.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

“Much more than periodic voting” – UN Independent Expert calls for more direct democracy worldwide http://www.ohchr.org/en/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=20482&LangID=E.
2016, “Much more than periodic voting” – UN Independent Expert calls for more direct democracy worldwide

World

“Do nine tenants in a residential building have the right to place the dumpsters in front of the tenth tenant's door? Seemingly, they enjoy a clear majority. But the role of democracy is not only to assure the governance of the majority, but to protect the rights of the minority.”

Yoel Esteron (1954) Israeli journalist

About the tyranny of the majority.
Who's for destroying democracy? (14-02-2016)

“Friends, Comrades and fellow South Africans. I greet you all in the name of peace, democracy and freedom for all. I stand here before you not as a prophet but as a humble servant of you, the people. Your tireless and heroic sacrifices have made it possible for me to be here today. I therefore place the remaining years of my life in your hands.”

Nelson Mandela (1918–2013) President of South Africa, anti-apartheid activist

1990s, Our March to Freedom is Irreversible (1990)

Life , People , Peace , Freedom

“Yet there is a danger even greater danger than terrorist attacks, the scenario of America as the last man standing. The lights may go out in Europe faster than you can imagine. An Islamic Europe means a Europe without freedom and democracy, an economic wasteland, an intellectual nightmare, and a loss of military might for America – as its allies will turn into enemies, enemies with atomic bombs. With an Islamic Europe, it would be up to America alone to preserve the heritage of Rome, Athens and Jerusalem.”

Geert Wilders (1963) Dutch politician

2000s, Speech at the Four Seasons, New York (25 September 2008)

Imagination , Freedom , Light , Loss

“… [ Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lucy Stone, Martin Luther King Jr. ]… didn’t let the ugliness and the obstacles deter them. They didn’t just give up and retreat to the comfortable company of like-minded folks, because they understood that this is how democracy operates. It is loud and messy, and it’s not particularly warm and fuzzy.”

Michelle Obama (1964) lawyer, writer, wife of Barack Obama and former First Lady of the United States

2010s, Commencement speech for Oberlin College Prep graduates (2015)

“The point of Obama's candidacy is that the damaged state of American democracy is not the fault of George W. Bush and his minions, the corporate-controlled media, the insurance industry, the oil industry, lobbyists, terrorists, illegal immigrants or Satan. The point is that this mess is our fault. We let in the serpents and liars, we exchanged shining ideals for a handful of nails and some two-by-fours, and we did it by resorting to the simplest, deepest-seated and readiest method we possess as human beings for trying to make sense of the world: through our fear. America has become a phobocracy.”

Michael Chabon (1963) Novelist, short story writer, essayist

Obama vs. the Phobocracy http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/03/AR2008020302526.html, Washington Post (February 4, 2008)

World , Fear , Sense

“How do they allow themselves to commit so many crimes? Is this the same democracy that Bush, Blair, and Sharon want to bring the Iraqi people as a gift? Death to this democracy. Is this how you want to present this democracy to the world? Shame on this democracy. Are you humans? Animals? What are you?…Why do they commit so many crimes? Stop it. Enough with the treachery. Enough with the crimes. The Iraqi people must know that they will steadfast. Even if half of them will be killed, they will not give up”

Ebrahim Amini (1925) Iranian ayatollah

Friday Sermon in Qom, Iran: America Will Not be Able to Stay Here http://www.memritv.org/clip_transcript/en/233.htm August 2004.
Democracy in Iraq

Death , People , World , Animals

“How is it possible that today's academic Left has supported rather than protested campus speech codes as well as the grotesque surveillance and over-regulation of student life? American colleges have abandoned their educational mission and become government colonies, ruled by officious bureaucrats enforcing federal dictates. This despotic imperialism has no place in a modern democracy.”

Camille Paglia book Free Women, Free Men

From the Introduction http://archive.is/4luev to Free Women, Free Men https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Special:BookSources/1101871814, Paglia, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group (2017)
Free Women, Free Men (2017)

Life , Education , Support

“The success of communism in the world today is due to the failure of democracy to live up to the noble ideals and principles inherent in its system. And this is what Jesus means when he said: "How is it that you can see the mote in your brother’s eye and not see the beam in your own eye?" Or to put it in Moffatt’s translation: "How is it that you see the splinter in your brother’s eye and fail to see the plank in your own eye?" And this is one of the tragedies of human nature. So we begin to love our enemies and love those persons that hate us whether in collective life or individual life by looking at ourselves. And this is one of the tragedies of human nature. So we begin to love our enemies and love those persons that hate us whether in collective life or individual life by looking at ourselves.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1950s, Loving Your Enemies (November 1957)

Love , Life , Hate , World

“I am particularly concerned about the recent allegations of mass persecutions of LGBTI people in the Chechen Republic of the Russian Federation. Discrimination and violence against LGBTI people is the worst kind of populism. Using minorities as scapegoats is unfortunately a growing trend. It is dangerous to democracy and governments must do all they can to stop it.”

Thorbjørn Jagland (1950) Norwegian politician

The Council of Europe member states have an obligation to protect LGBTI people http://www.coe.int/en/web/portal/-/the-council-of-europe-member-states-have-an-obligation-to-protect-lgbti-people, DC069(2017), Strasbourg, May 17, 2017.

People

“Every little school boy is trained to recite the weaknesses and inefficiencies of the Articles of Confederation. It is taken as axiomatic that under them the new nation was falling into anarchy and was only saved by the wisdom and energy of the Convention. … The nation had to be strong to repel invasion, strong to pay to the last loved copper penny the debts of the propertied and the provident ones, strong to keep the unpropertied and improvident from ever using the government to secure their own prosperity at the expense of moneyed capital. … No one suggests that the anxiety of the leaders of the heretofore unquestioned ruling classes desired the revision of the Articles and labored so weightily over a new instrument not because the nation was failing under the Articles, but because it was succeeding only too well. Without intervention from the leaders, reconstruction threatened in time to turn the new nation into an agrarian and proletarian democracy. … All we know is that at a time when the current of political progress was in the direction of agrarian and proletarian democracy, a force hostile to it gripped the nation and imposed upon it a powerful form against which it was never to succeed in doing more than blindly struggle. The liberating virus of the Revolution was definitely expunged, and henceforth if it worked at all it had to work against the State, in opposition to the armed and respectable power of the nation.”

Randolph Bourne (1886–1918) American writer

¶13. Published under "The Development of the American State," The State https://mises.org/library/state (Tucson, Arizona: See Sharp Press, 1998), pp. 33–34.
"The State" (1918), II

Love , Wisdom , Money , Hostility

“The conclusion, so vexatious to democracy, that wisdom and not popularity qualifies for rule may be forced upon us by the peril in atomic energy.”

Richard M. Weaver (1910–1963) American scholar

Source: Ideas have Consequences (1948), p. 65.

Wisdom

“Women are going to lead the democracy movement, mark my words.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2010s, 2011, Speech at the Gerald R. Ford Foundation (2011)

Women

“While in totalitarian regimes, government controls the media and criminalizes journalists, bloggers and human rights defenders who do not echo the State’s propaganda, in numerous democratic countries, the media are largely in private hands — too few hands. Often media are controlled by conglomerates responsive to corporations and advertisers who determine the content of news and other programmes, frequently disseminating disinformation or suppressing crucial information necessary for democratic discourse. Indeed, the media blackout on important issues constitutes a grave obstacle to democracy, since absent sufficient information and without free and pluralistic media, democracy is dysfunctional and the political process, including elections, becomes a mere formality — not an expression of the will of the people.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

2013
Source: United Nations General Assembly - Promotion of a democratic and equitable international order http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/IntOrder/A-68-284_en.pdf.

People , Country

“America is the object of their loathing because, for a half-century or more, she has been the most prosperous and creative capitalist society on earth. Ultimately it is liberal democracy - or quite simply liberty itself - that they are eager to destroy, even though they are among its foremost beneficiaries, being free to travel anywhere, anytime in order to hatch their plots. If their diktats were carried out, if frontier barriers were reestablished everywhere, with passports and visas even for tourists, there could have been no Seattle and no Goteborg.”

Jean-François Revel (1924–2006) French writer and philosopher

Source: 2000s, Anti-Americanism (2003), p. 35

Travel

“We can say that voting […] is at the heart of both the method and the ideal of democracy.”

William H. Riker (1920–1993) American political scientist

Liberalism Against Populism (1982)

Heart

“While the outward face of democracy may be a multiparty system and regular elections, some observers contend that there is a substantial difference between the right to vote and the right to choose policies. If the choice of candidates for election does not correspond to the desires of the people, then a pro forma election among candidates who have been put up by political machines does not further the credibility or legitimacy of such democracies. This is not democracy but “partitocracy”. If the only choices are between candidates A and B, whose programmes are often very similar, the electorate does not have a real voice and the election does not satisfy the essence of what democratic government must be. In such cases, the two-party system shows itself to be twice as democratic as the oneparty system. True democracy requires real choices as well as transparent and accountable governance and administration in all sectors of society.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

Interim report of the Independent Expert on the promotion of a democratic and equitable international order, Alfred Maurice de Zayas http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/IntOrder/A.67.277_en.pdf.
2012

People

“The conclusions are self-evident, so I just state them. Electoral winners and losers obey the results of democratic competition and thus democracy is sustained merely as a consequence of political forces pursuing their interests. Whether this explanation is sufficient or some cultural patterns are necessary for democracy to endure is just hard to tell, as is whether democracy can survive even when it is not supported by economic self-interest.”

Adam Przeworski (1940) Polish-American academic

Chapter 5. "Why Do Political Parties Obey Results of Elections?" in Democracy and the Rule of Law (2003) edited by José María Maravall and Adam Przeworski

Support

“Now we have Peronism that is everything: it's the far right and its the center, it's left centrist and is also extreme leftist, it is democracy and is also terrorism, its demagogy is also insanity…Peronism is everything.”

Mario Vargas Llosa (1936) Peruvian writer, politician, journalist, and essayist

Ahora tenemos un peronismo que es todo: es la extrema derecha, es el centro, es el centro izquierda, es la extrema izquierda, es la democracia y es el terrorismo, es la demagogia y es la insensatez... Todo es el peronismo...
Mario Vargas Llosa compara al peronismo con los nazis y lo culpa de destruir Argentina http://www.lanacion.com.ar/1474566-mario-vargas-llosa-compara-al-peronismo-con-los-nazis-y-lo-culpa-de-destruir-argentina

“In Arab countries today, bin Ladenism looks like a nightmare from a bygone era. Many Arabs have discovered that the alternative to despotism is democracy, not al Qaeda. In fact, the Arab Spring became possible partly because the new urban middle classes were convinced that, by rising against despots, they wouldn’t be jumping into the fire from the frying pan. There was a time when bin Laden’s slightest utterance made the headlines in most Arab countries. Gradually, however, he came to provoke only a yawn in most places. Even the Qatari satellite-TV network al-Jazeera, which made its reputation as “bin Laden’s home TV,” stopped giving him star treatment. Left behind by developments in Arab countries, al Qaeda has gradually shed its ideological pretensions and mutated into a purely terrorist franchise. Its motto: One man, one bomb. Shut out of Arab countries, al Qaeda has been recruiting among Muslims in Europe and North America. Hundreds of European, American and Canadian Muslims have been to al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The group also has sleeper cells in some Asian countries — notably India, Thailand and the Philippines. It will also keep Pakistan high on its target list, and continue to help the Taliban in its forlorn attempt at regaining power. Yet al Qaeda is bound to fade away, as have all terrorist organizations in history — though this will take some time. Meanwhile, the major democracies should throw their support behind the Arab Spring and help it find its way to a future free of both despotism and Islamic terrorism.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"Evil reign collapsed years before he fell" http://nypost.com/2011/05/03/evil-reign-collapsed-years-before-he-fell/, New York Post (May 3, 2011).
New York Post

Way , Home , History , Star

“Hypocrisy, double standards, and "but nots" are the price of universalist pretensions. Democracy is promoted, but not if it brings Islamic fundamentalists to power; nonproliferation is preached for Iran and Iraq, but not for Israel; free trade is the elixir of economic growth, but not for agriculture; human rights are an issue for China, but not with Saudi Arabia; aggression against oil-owning Kuwaitis is massively repulsed, but not against non-oil-owning Bosnians. Double standards in practice are the unavoidable price of universal standards of principle.”

Samuel P. Huntington (1927–2008) American political scientist

Source: The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1996), Ch. 8 : The West and the Rest: Intercivilizational Issues, § 1 : Western Universalism, p. 184

Universe

“It is no more evident that democratic institutions are to be measured by the sort of person they create than that they are to be measured against divine commands. … Even if the typical character types of liberal democracies are bland, calculating, petty, and unheroic, the prevalence of such people may be a reasonable price to pay for political freedom.”

Richard Rorty (1931–2007) American philosopher

"The priority of democracy to philosophy"

People , Freedom , Personality

“Democracy can't thrive under military rule — history is quite clear on this point … The police state is back, and it is even worse than Hosni Mubarak's. What is happening in Egypt today is very scary: The coup could lead society to lose its faith in democracy, which will give terrorist groups a chance to breathe again…By blocking peaceful change and weakening the Islamist groups that participate in the political process, the coup leaders support this stance and do the terrorists a favor.”

Tawakkol Karman (1979) Yemeni journalist, politician, human rights activist, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient

2010s, Morsy is the Arab World's Mandela (2013)

Peace , Faith , History , Support

“Looking at the contemporary world, two things are obvious: democracy is doing rather badly, and democracy is doing very well. New states are born free, yet everywhere they are in chains. Democracy is doing very badly in that democratic institutions have fallen by the wayside in very many of the newly independent 'transitional' societies, and they are precarious elsewhere. Democracy, on the other hand, is doing extremely well in so far as it is almost (though not quite) universally accepted as a valid norm.”

Ernest Gellner (1925–1995) Czech anthropologist, philosopher and sociologist

Contemporary Thought and Politics (1974)

World , Universe

“When public men indulge themselves in abuse, when they deny others a fair trial, when they resort to innuendo and insinuation, to libel, scandal, and suspicion, then our democratic society is outraged, and democracy is baffled.”

J. William Fulbright (1905–1995) American politician

Speech in the Senate on McCarthyism (February 2, 1954), Congressional Record, vol. 100. p. 1105

Men

“We want to take a chance on more democracy.”

Willy Brandt (1913–1992) German social-democratic politician; Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany

Wir wollen mehr Demokratie wagen.
government policy statement on 28 October 1969, p. 1, bwbs.de http://www.bwbs.de/UserFiles/File/PDF/Regierungserklaerung691028.pdf (PDF file).

Chance

“Social movements for global democracy and justice should try not only to build on and create global legal and regulatory institutions, but also to expand possibilities for transnational association and public spheres.”

Iris Marion Young book Inclusion and Democracy

Inclusion and Democracy (2000), Ch. 7: Self-Determination and Global Democracy

Justice

“In every well-governed state, wealth is a sacred thing; in democracies it is the only sacred thing.”

Anatole France (1844–1924) French writer

Dans tout État policé, la richesse est chose sacrée; dans les démocraties elle est la seule chose sacrée.
L'Île des Pingouins http://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/L%27%C3%8Ele_des_Pingouins_-_Livre_VI_:_Les_Temps_modernes#CHAPITRE_II._PYROT [Penguin Island] (1908), Book VI: Les Temps Modernes, Ch. II: Pyrot

Wealth

“[T]rade, not democracy, is the best antidote to war.”

Ilana Mercer South African writer

"The Warmongers: Not Looking Out For Us" http://www.wnd.com/2013/09/the-warmongers-not-looking-out-for-us WorldNetDaily.com, September 26, 2013.
2010s, 2013

War

“Some Muslim scholars argue that the concept of Democracy is not compatible with the concept of an Islamic state. But of course it is and the Quran outlines the essence of Democracy.”

Muhammad Asad (1900–1992) Austro-Hungarian writer and academic

Documentary, A Road To Mecca.

“Korean nationalism has not only energized the North’s march to nuclear armament, but also exerted a growing appeal on people in the South — the ideological discourse of which republic has received even less attention than the North’s. The average American knows only that in the 1980s liberal democracy replaced authoritarianism here”

Brian Reynolds Myers (1963) American professor of international studies

in South Korea
2010s, A Note on Singapore (June 2018)

People

“Operational analysis … cannot raise the decisive question whether the consent itself was not the work of manipulation—a question for which the actual state of affairs provides ample justification. The analysis cannot raise it because it would transcend its terms toward transitive meaning—toward a concept of democracy which would reveal the democratic election as a rather limited democratic process. Precisely such a non-operational concept is the one rejected by the authors as “unrealistic” because it defines democracy on too articulate a level as the clear-cut control of representation by the electorate—popular control as popular sovereignty.”

Herbert Marcuse book One-Dimensional Man

Source: One-Dimensional Man (1964), p. 116

Question , Decision

“The Palestinians are a despotic, undemocratic grouping which promotes a religious war against Israel, a democracy, through terror.”

Melanie Phillips (1951) British journalist

http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/archives/001241.html

War

“Now, at present Britain has no V. A. T., and the questions whether this new tax should be introduced, how it should be levied, and what should be its scope, would be matters of debate in the country and in Parliament. The essence of parliamentary democracy lies in the power to debate and impose taxation: it is the vital principle of the British House of Commons, from which all other aspects of its sovereignty ultimately derive. With Britain in the community, one important element of taxation would be taken automatically, necessarily and permanently out of the hands of the House of Commons…Those matters which sovereign parliaments debate and decide must be debated and decided not by the British House of Commons but in some other place, and by some other body, and debated and decided once for the whole Community…it is a fact that the British Parliament and its paramount authority occupies a position in relation to the British nation which no other elective assembly in Europe possesses. Take parliament out of the history of England and that history itself becomes meaningless. Whole lifetimes of study cannot exhaust the reasons why this fact has come to be, but fact it is, so that the British nation could not imagine itself except with and through its parliament. Consequently the sovereignty of our parliament is something other for us than what your assemblies are for you. What is equally significant, your assemblies, unlike the British Parliament, are the creation of deliberate political acts, and most of recent political acts. The notion that a new sovereign body can be created is therefore as familiar to you as it is repugnant, not to say unimaginable, to us. This deliberate, and recent, creation of sovereign assemblies on the continent is in turn an aspect of the fact that the continent is familiar, and familiar in the recent past, with the creation of nation states themselves. Four of the six members of the Community came into existence as such no more than a century or a century and a half ago – within the memory of two lifetimes.”

Enoch Powell (1912–1998) British politician

Speech in Lyons (12 February 1971), from The Common Market: The Case Against (Elliot Right Way Books, 1971), pp. 65-68.
1970s

Imagination , History , Communication , Question

“Democracy means a genuine correlation between the will of the people and legislation and policies that affect them, be it domestic or international.”

Alfred de Zayas (1947) American United Nations official

“Much more than periodic voting” – UN Independent Expert calls for more direct democracy worldwide http://www.ohchr.org/en/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=20482&LangID=E.
2016, “Much more than periodic voting” – UN Independent Expert calls for more direct democracy worldwide

People

“For a democracy to be healthy and effective, three political parties fight elections so that they can replace one another in Governments every few years. Dictatorial governments are either communist, or fascist, or military or personal. Nothing can control the power and wealth of a dictator. History has shown that there were no benevolent dictators and even if a saint became a dictator, he would be corrupted by the unlimited power and wealth at his command, and soon become a despot and tyrant. Mahatma Gandhi, who got us freedom by the unique method of non-violent resistance against evil was an ideal democrat.”

Morarji Desai (1896–1995) Former Indian Finance Minister, Freedom Fighters, Former prime minister

As quoted in Commissions and Omissions by Indian Prime Ministers (1996) by Janak Raj Jai, Volume 1, p. 218

History , Freedom , Evil , Fight

“All the world saw him being killed, all bloodied. Is that democracy? And who did it? Drones, including American ones, delivered a strike on his motorcade. Then commandos, who were not supposed to be there, brought in so-called opposition and militants. And killed him without trial.”

Vladimir Putin (1952) President of Russia, former Prime Minister

On Muammar Gaddafi's Death. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/8958294/Vladimir-Putin-calls-John-McCain-nuts-in-outspoken-attack.html
2011 - 2015

World