Best 212 quotes in «dictatorship quotes» category

It is true, however, that a dictator's problem is a self-fulfilling prophecy: precisely because he reserves the right of decision for himself, he soon finds himself required to decide everything.

It seems that Russia today—dominated by, and accustomed to, autocracy and empire, and lacking strong civic institutions especially after the shattering of its society by the Bolshevik Terror—is destined to be ruled by self-promoting cliques for some time yet.

It's unfortunate to be bitten by political ambition. The deadly disease causes a man to want to access power by all means either by sacrificing others to its altar or by sacrificing himself when he fails.

It was one of the greatest errors in evaluating dictatorship to say that the dictator forces himself on society against its own will. In reality, every dictator in history was nothing but the accentuation of already existing state ideas which he had only to exaggerate in order to gain power

Most of our brains are out, but it is good what they did for themselves by leaving this country. They are Cameroon’s reserve for development, for the day that this country shall be free. Your late father was an intelligent man. He was even more than that. He was a sage. He once said to me that the intelligent Bamilekés are those who have sought a better future for themselves and for their families in British Cameroons. He was right. They have not been brainwashed as much as their francophone brothers have. If he were alive today, I am sure he would have judged that the intelligent Cameroonians are those who have sought refuge out of Cameroon.

Without the power to put them into practice, truths are of no use. They remain academic. Power, no matter what kind of power it is, without a foundation in truth, is a dictatorship, more or less and in one way or another, for it is always based on man's fear of the social responsibility and personal burden that "freedom" entails. Dictatorial power and truth do not go together. They are mutually exclusive.

Looking into the mirror I ask myself: "You live in a house equipped with air conditioning. You eat tasty food. You utilize convenient transportation to travel. You utilize convenient information technology to live. Could you not say that you, who do all this, are not a dictator? Isn't it right that you life is supported by somebody else's death? Doesn't your life that exists at the expense of somebody else's sacrifice infinitely resemble the life of a dictator who only cares about his own life?" -Yasumasa Morimura (excerpt from "Mr. Morimura's Dictator Speech").

One need only to admit that public tranquillity is in danger and any action finds a justification. All the horrors of the reign of terror were based only on solicitude for public tranquillity.

[N]icht durch Reden und Majoritätsbeschlüsse werden die großen Fragen der Zeit entschiedenen [...] sondern durch Eisen und Blut.

No dictator has a healthy mind because only a sick mind can be a dictator!

No dictatorship can tolerate jazz. It is the first sign of a return to freedom.

Obviously, there must be some connection between the subordination of actual individuals and the grotesque exaltation of symbolic ones like Kim Il Sung.

One-man regimes belong to old eras; they involve clowning and arbitrariness! In the twenty-first century only the silly and larky nations give permission to such third-class contemptible regimes!

One reason for the dictatorship’s unmerited reputation for clamping down on corruption is that it did clamp down on reports of corruption: in one case, when a diplomat announced he would publish a book about graft under the military government, the regime kidnapped, tortured, and murdered him.

Noch nie hat die Demokratie so prompt reagiert, wie wenn es sich darum handelt, etwas gegen die Diktatur nicht zu tun.

Nothing is sweeter and addictive than power, the unlucky soul this demon possesses, if he is not sacrificed on its altar will sacrifice others himself to get it

Once you are in power, never forget those who put you there. Deal with those who think they can do better than you and those who think you are god's representative on earth. Deal with each other according to his actions

One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power.

Only a person who perceives that all human beings are important can become a great leader.

(On the communist regime of Ceaușescu) "Romania," said Eugene, "was twenty million people living inside the imagination of a madman.

Open avowal of dictatorship is much less dangerous than sham democracy. The first one can fight; sham democracy is insidious.

Open confession of dictatorship is far less dangerous than sham democracy. One can defend oneself against the former; the latter is like a creeper attached to the body of a drowning man.

Polish leader Boleslaw Bierut, a charisma-free life support system for a bureaucrat's mustache.

Politicians know it's a game of power, every politician at every level, even in the common of mortals.

Power hungry=life loving

Power without compassion is like a giant that blocks the sunlight.

Power without morality leads to abuse, and freedom without morality leads to depravity.

Serikali inayodhulumu wananchi wake ni hatari kuliko simba.

Sí, dijo Pereira, pero si ellos tuvieran razón mi vida no tendría sentido, no tendría sentido haber estudiado Letras en Coimbra y haber creído siempre que la literatura era la cosa más importante del mundo, no tendría sentido que yo dirija la página cultural de ese periódico vespertino en el que no puedo expresar mi opinión y en el que tengo que publicar cuentos del siglo XIX francés, ya nada tendría sentido, y es de eso de lo que siento deseos de arrepentirme, como si yo fuera otra persona y no el Pereira que ha sido siempre periodista, como si tuviera que renegar de algo.

So-called Islamic 'fundamentalism' does not spring, in Pakistan, from the people. It is imposed on them from above. Autocratic regimes find it useful to espouse the rhetoric of faith, because people respect that language, are reluctant to oppose it. This how religions shore up dictators; by encircling them with words of power, words which the people are reluctant to see discredited, disenfranchised, mocked. But the ramming-down-the-throat point stands. In the end you get sick of it, you lose faith in the faith, if not qua faith then certainly as basis for a state. And then the dictator falls, and it is discovered that he had brought God down with him, that the justifying myth of the nation has been unmade. This leaves only two options: disintegration, or a new dictatorship ... no, there is a third, and I shall not be o pessimistic as to deny its possibility. The third option is the substitution of a new myth for the old one. Here are three such myths, all available from stock at short notice: liberty; equality; fraternity. I recommend them highly.

Supporting a dictator is no different than eating a poisonous mushroom!

The breakdown of the European party system occurred in a spectacular way with Hitler's rise to power. It is now often conveniently forgotten that at the moment of the outbreak of the second World War, the majority of European countries has already adopted some form of dictatorship and discarded the party system, and that this revolutionary change in government has been effected in most countries without revolutionary upheaval. Revolutionary action more often than not was a theatrical concession to the desires of violently discontented masses rather than an actual battle for power. After all, it did not make much difference if a few thousand almost unarmed people staged a march on Rome and took over the government of Italy, or whether in Poland (in 1934) a so-called "partyless bloc," with a program of support for a semifascist government and a membership drawn from the nobility and the poorest peasantry, workers and businessmen, Catholics and orthodox Jews, legally won two-thirds of the seats in Parliament.

The capital city of the Dominican Republic is Santo Domingo, founded in 1496 by Bartholomew Columbus, Christopher’s brother. Rafael Leónidas Trujillo served as President from 1930 to 1938 and again from 1942 to 1952, continuing to rule for the rest of the time as an unelected strongman using figurehead presidents. He renamed the capital city of the Dominican Republic to Ciudad Trujillo after himself. His régime lasted for over thirty years, until his assassination on May 30, 1961, while riding in his car on the outskirts of the city. After he was gunned down, his riddled body was taken to France and interred in the famous Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, bringing to an end “La Era de Trujillo.” Six years later Trujillo’s body was moved to the El Pardo Cemetery near Madrid, Spain, where it now rests.

The degree of liberty or tyranny in any government is in large degree a reflection of the relative determination of the subjects to be free and their willingness and ability to resist efforts to enslave them.

The dictators, commanders or emperors who want to conquer the world soon realize that the world has already been conquered by the artists and their arts!

The dictator says "You are allowed to think as you want" but never write it down or talk about it. If you cross these borders we cannot guarantee your security

People living in the free world have no idea of the hidden economic cost the mere existence of dictatorship in the world imposes on them.

Powerless=lifeless.

Power swells the head and shatters the crown.

Remember, the difference between a dictator and a true leader, is in intention.

Some clever and honourable nations change their regime from authoritarian to a democratic one, and some weak-kneed dictator lover miserable nations do the exact opposite! Don’t try to look for a character in a person who gave up his freedom, because he does have none!

Somehow, people always forget that it's much easier to install a dictator than to remove one

The Constitution, the National Assembly, the dynastic parties, the blue and the red republicans, the heroes of Africa, the thunder from the platform, the sheet lightning of the daily press, the entire literature, the political names and the intellectual reputations, the civil law and penal code, the liberté, égalité, fraternité and the second of May 1852—all have vanished like a phantasmagoria before the spell of a man whom even his enemies do not make out to be a magician. Universal suffrage seems to have survived only for a moment, in order that with its own hand it may make its last will and testament before the eyes of all the world and declare in the name of the people itself: Everything that exists has this much worth, that it will perish.

The dictatorship is embodied in the formal structure of the film (Days of 36). Imposed silence was one of the conditions under which we worked. The film is... made in such a way that the spectator realizes that censorship is involved.

The Golden Mean is for the weakling, it was not meant for the likes of Alexander the Great, Cyrus, Pharaohs, or Hitlers of the world

The good shall prevail in the end, the truth shall be the rule and the Cameroonian soul shall be free,” Hans said in an emotion-choked voice, “However, we should never lose our heads; we should always be prepared to forgive all the repentant souls.

The highest mode of corruption is the abuse of power.

Politics does not make leaders, leaders make right politics.

The little boats cannot make much difference to the welfare of Gaza either way, since the materials being shipped are in such negligible quantity. The chief significance of the enterprise is therefore symbolic. And the symbolism, when examined even cursorily, doesn't seem too adorable. The intended beneficiary of the stunt is a ruling group with close ties to two of the most retrograde dictatorships in the Middle East, each of which has recently been up to its elbows in the blood of its own civilians. The same group also manages to maintain warm relations with, or at the very least to make cordial remarks about, both Hezbollah and al-Qaida. Meanwhile, a document that was once accurately described as a 'warrant for genocide' forms part of the declared political platform of the aforesaid group. There is something about this that fails to pass a smell test.

The main reason for the people who support a dictator is that their character perfectly match with the character of that dictator! They both have a mean personality!