Rebirth and Destiny of Israel (1954), p. 419; a portion of this paragraph has sometimes been misquoted as: "To maintain the status quo will not do. We have to set up a dynamic state bent upon expansion."
Context: Our code must be framed to speed the absorption of immigrants into our economy, culture and society; to fuse the returning tribes into a homogeneous national and cultural unit; to forward our physical and moral healing and the cleansing of our lives from the trivia and dross which gathered upon us in dependence and exile. To maintain the status quo will not do. We have set up a dynamic State, bent upon creation and reform, building and expansion. Laws which lag behind development, merely a digest of experience and the lessons of the past, are useless to us. We need to anticipate the character of the times, discern embryonic forms emergent or renewed, and clear the path for circumstantial change.
“NGOs have a complicated space in neoliberal politics. They are supposed to mop up the anger. Even when they are doing good work, they are supposed to maintain the status quo. They are the missionaries of the corporate world.”
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Arundhati Roy 122
Indian novelist, essayist 1961Related quotes
“Every ruler wants to maintain the status quo.”
Interlude “Summer, 1818” (p. 170)
The Stress of Her Regard (1989)
No more taxation by citation in Ferguson: Column https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2016/08/09/taxation-ferguson-police-reform-michael-brown-shooting-column/88445780/ (August 9, 2016)
“Bureaucracy defends the status quo long past the time when the quo has lost its status.”
Source: Peter's Quotations: Ideas for Our Time (1977), p. 83
Source: The Call of the Carpenter (1914), p. xxi
Source: Your Job-Hunt Ltd – Advice from an Award-Winning Asian Headhunter (2003), Successful Recruitment in a Week (2012) https://books.google.ae/books?idp24GkAsgjGEC&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIGjAA#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, Managing Teams in a Week (2013) https://books.google.ae/books?idqZjO9_ov74EC&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIIDAB#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, Secrets of Success at Work – 50 techniques to excel (2014) https://books.google.ae/books?id4S7vAgAAQBAJ&printsecfrontcover&dqnigel+cumberland&hlen&saX&ved0ahUKEwjF75Xw0IHNAhULLcAKHazACBMQ6AEIJjAC#vonepage&qnigel%20cumberland&ffalse, p.80
“Their pledge is a pledge to the status quo — and today there can be no status quo.”
Address Accepting the Democratic Party Nomination for the Presidency of the United States — Memorial Coliseum, Los Angeles (15 July 1960) http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/JFK-Quotations.aspx<!-- Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project -->
1960
Context: Their platform, made up of left-over Democratic planks, has the courage of our old convictions. Their pledge is a pledge to the status quo — and today there can be no status quo.
"Preface"
Why I Am a Vegetarian: An Address Delivered before the Chicago Vegetarian Society (1895)
Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life (2011)