Best 3411 quotes in «democracy quotes» category

The main problem in any democracy is that crowd-pleasers are generally brainless swine who can go out on a stage & whup their supporters into an orgiastic frenzy - then go back to the office & sell every one of the poor bastards down the tube for a nickel apiece. Probably the rarest form of life in American politics is the man who can turn on a crowd & still keep his head straight - assuming it was straight in the first place.

The majority of men cannot be made disinterested for life by exhortation, by religious services, by any expenditure of subsidized works, or even by grave and manifest public need. They can be made permanently unselfish only by being helped to become disinterested in their individual purposes. In the complete democracy a man must in some way be made to serve the nation in the very act of contributing to his own individual fulfillment. Not until his personal action is dictated by disinterested motives can there be any such harmony between private and public interests.

The majority is the best way, because it is visible, and has strength to make itself obeyed. Yet it is the opinion of the least able.

The majority of the world's Muslims do not believe that terrorism is a legitimate strategy or that Islam is incompatible with democracy.

The masses of Negroes...particularly in the South, still breed carelessly and disasterously, with the result that the increase among Negroes, even more than among whites, is from that portion of the population least intelligent and fit.

The many refugees are not a Greek or German problem. They are a European problem. We should therefore develop a common strategy. That's why I am launching a cross-border movement for more democracy.

The market is a democracy in which every penny gives a right to vote.

The method of democracy is to bring conflicts out into the open where their special claims can be seen and appraised, where they can be discussed and judged.

The minority must have involvement in society. You can have different cultural practices that you accept. But if you are going to adopt democracy in government, then the government itself must allow the minority to be heard.

The modern university does not exist to teach alone...It exists also to serve the democracy of which it is a product and an ornament...The university rests on the public will and on public appreciation.

The modern infrastructures that exists in the world all contribute to the advancement of human rights and democracy.

The moment politics becomes dull, democracy is in danger.

The moral case is, people say, "Oh they're not ready for democracy," but that's something someone who lives in a democracy would say about someone who doesn't live in a democracy. Well, if democracy is the highest form of human potential, then it can't be true for us and not for them. But, the practical case is democracies don't invade their neighbors. Democracies don't traffic in child soldiers. Democracies don't harbor terrorists as a state policy. So there's a reason to have more democratic states.

The money pigs of capitalist democracy: Money has made slaves of us. Money is the curse of mankind. It smothers the seed of everything great and good. Every penny is sticky with sweat and blood.

The more developed a nation is, the more complete is the independence of the individual, and the safer the individual from encroachments by another.

The more people participate in the process of their own education, and the more people participate in defining what kind of production to produce, and for what and why, the more people participate in the development of their selves. The more people become themselves, the better the democracy.

The more there is a need to talk about the ideals of democracy, the less democratic the system usually is.

The most important element of democracy, I believe, is the protection of minorities.

The most important thing the giant philanthropies could do - Gates, Rockefeller, Ford, Open Society Institute, and new ones emerging - would be to create a $2-to-$3 billion Trust for Independent Journalism. They wouldn't miss the money, and democracy would still have a fighting chance because of their investment.

The most merciful thing a large family can do to one of its infant members is to kill it.

The most striking thing about the rich is the gracious democracy of their manners -- and the crude vulgarity of their way of life.

The motive power of democracy is love

The much-lauded parliamentary democracy in India has been unable to protect a genuine democratic set-up in Kashmir.

The nature of democracy is such that when there's - there'll be revulsion, obviously, towards - that's never going to happen again.

The need to help spread democracy and the ability to do that will be much greater if we break this addiction to oil, which gives the oil princes and sultans the power in the Mideast.

The [Nazi party] should not become a constable of public opinion, but must dominate it. It must not become a servant of the masses, but their master!

The neoliberal programs of the last generation have in fact been, and were intended to be, a pretty serious attack on democracy, but also they've led to stagnation or decline for large parts of the population - the working class, the lower middle class, these people have essentially been cast aside.

The nightmare in every democracy, the very nightmare, is if it gets worse and worse and worse, we could end up totalitarian.

The new social question is: democracy or the rule of the financial markets. We are currently witnessing the end of an era. The neoliberal ideology has failed worldwide. The U.S. movement Occupy Wall Street is a good example of this.

The office of president is a bastardized thing, half royalty and half democracy that nobody knows whether to genuflect or spit.

The novel as a form is usually seen to be moral if its readers consider freedom, individuality, democracy, privacy, social connection, tolerance and hope to be morally good, but it is not considered moral if the highest values of a society are adherence to rules and traditional mores, the maintenance of hierarchical relationships, and absolute ideas of right and wrong. Any society based on the latter will find novels inherently immoral and subversive.

The Norwegian response to violence is more democracy, more openness and greater political participation.

The number one priority of President Trump is to rebuild our military, to restore the arsenal of democracy.

The one pervading evil of democracy is the tyranny of the majority.

The old fundamental principles must continue to apply, even in our changing society: Democracy knows neither master nor slave. Equal education opportunities for all, no matter where they come from and no matter who their parents are. Equal access as well when it comes to digitalization.

The only force at the disposal of democracy is that of public opinion.

The only force that can overcome an idea and a faith is another and better idea and faith, positively and fearlessly upheld.

The only distinction that democracies reward is a high degree of conformity.

The only negative thing in Pakistan is not having a democracy.

The only way to save the world is through socialism, but a socialism that exists within a democracy; there's no dictatorship here.

The only salvation of the world today... is the rapid dissemination of the basic values of the West, that is, the ideas of democracy, human rights, the civil society, and the free market.

The only right we do not and should not have in a liberal democracy is a right not to be offended.

The only way to achieve a practical, livable peace in a world of competing nations is to take the profit out of war.

The origin of all power is in the people, and they have an incontestable right to check the creatures of their own creation.

The Paris Commune was first and foremost a democracy. The government was a body elected by universal suffrage.

The parliament is the supreme decision-making and legislative body in any democracy. It reflects the collective desires of the citizens and makes laws.

The passengers and crew of United Airlines Flight 93, recognizing the potential danger that the aircraft they were aboard posed to large numbers of innocent Americans, American institutions, and the symbols of American democracy, took heroic and noble action to ensure that the aircraft they were aboard could not be used as a weapon.

The peaceful transition of power is one of the hallmarks of our democracy.

The people in Arab countries are now speaking out and asking many questions about human rights, minorities, religion, democracy, "the other," and so on.

The peoples of Yugoslavia do not want Fascism. They do not want a totalitarian regime, they do not want to become slaves of the German and Italian financial oligarchy as they never wanted to become reconciled to the semi-colonial dependence imposed on them by the so-called Western democracies after the first imperialist war.