““Policy” is the negation of politics; policy is by definition something concocted by some form of elite, which presumes it knows better than others how their affairs are to be conducted. By participating in policy debates the very best one can achieve is to limit the damage, since the very premise is inimical to the idea of people managing their own affairs.”

Source: Fragments for an Anarchist Anthropology (2004), p. 9

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "“Policy” is the negation of politics; policy is by definition something concocted by some form of elite, which presumes…" by David Graeber?
David Graeber photo
David Graeber 55
American anthropologist and anarchist 1961

Related quotes

Fidel Castro photo

“Some people wanted to know what the policy of the Revolutionary Government of Cuba was. Very well, then, this is our policy.”

Fidel Castro (1926–2016) former First Secretary of the Communist Party and President of Cuba

ovation
At the United Nations (1960)

George Washington photo

“I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy.”

George Washington (1732–1799) first President of the United States

1790s, Farewell Address (1796)
Context: Tis our true policy to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world; so far, I mean, as we are now at liberty to do it; for let me not be understood as capable of patronizing infidelity to existing engagements. I hold the maxim no less applicable to public than to private affairs, that honesty is always the best policy. I repeat it, therefore, let those engagements be observed in their genuine sense. But, in my opinion, it is unnecessary and would be unwise to extend them.

Dana Milbank photo

“It would seem the incoming Trump administration plans to handle its affairs — domestic and foreign — in a manner that meets the dictionary definition of a “rogue state” as one “that conducts its policy in a dangerously unpredictable way.””

Dana Milbank (1968) American journalist

Trump’s one consistent policy: Chaos https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trumps-one-consistent-policy-chaos/2016/12/06/f1a5a5ae-bbf7-11e6-91ee-1adddfe36cbe_story.html?utm_term=.f664c9ebc888, The Washington Post (December 6, 2016)

George F. Kennan photo

“A political society does not live to conduct foreign policy; it would be more correct to say that it conducts foreign policy in order to live.”

George F. Kennan (1904–2005) American advisor, diplomat, political scientist and historian

Lecture at Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey (March 1954); published in “The Two Planes of International Reality” in Realities of American Foreign Policy (1954), p. 4

“For me, a key lesson is that Friedman’s influence was achieved mainly through the force of ideas, not by direct participation in the policy process.”

Robert Barro (1944) American classical macroeconomist

Source: Nothing Is Sacred (2002), p. 3

Jeremy Corbyn photo

“I are very concerned, however, to make sure there can be open and proper debate about Israel and its foreign policy, and about the future for Palestinian people. Hence there has to be that space for debate, you cannot shut that down. But it can never, ever be conducted in an anti-Semitic way.”

Jeremy Corbyn (1949) British Labour Party politician

Jeremy Corbyn condemns ex-Labour MP's comments in anti-Semitism row https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-45244081, BBC News, 20 August 2018
2010s, 2018

“Our world today is in the grip of anti-capitalism. State bureaucracies ruling over anti-market policies have grown into ideological and political elites who arrogantly presume to know and dictate how we should all live and work.”

Richard Ebeling (1950) American economist

“Is the ‘Spectre of Communism’ Still Haunting the World?” https://fee.org/resources/is-the-spectre-of-communism-still-haunting-the-world/, speech entitled “Evenings at FEE” in March 2006. Posted in Foundation for Economic Education (FEE), (December 19, 2008)

Wilhelm Liebknecht photo

Related topics