Ian Bremmer Quotes & Sayings

I don't see a coherent global order anywhere on the horizon. — Ian Bremmer

Berlin is a very edgy place, a very cosmopolitan place. It's a place where completely different ideas and cultures come together and clash in a very warm way. In a very warm-hearted way. — Ian Bremmer

I was fifteen in college at Tulane. I lied about my age in college so that I could be normal socially. So that girls would go out with me and stuff like that. I just said I was normal age. — Ian Bremmer

Our superhero foreign policy draws rivers of taxpayer dollars toward the center, empowering Washington at the expense of local governments. It also empowers the president at the expense of Congress in ways that upset the balance that the authors of the Constitution took great pains to design. — Ian Bremmer

There is too large a divergence at the moment in the interests and values of the world's most powerful states. — Ian Bremmer

I absolutely am an environmentalist. I am probably more of an environmentalist than most people who live in the world, but I think that comes from my position in the world and that doesn't make me a better person. — Ian Bremmer

The government has to be on the side of the people if the corporations take too much power. — Ian Bremmer

In environments where corporations become too interventionist and capture regulation themselves, the government must be able to battle back so that the people have a chance. — Ian Bremmer

Authoritarian governments are now trying to ensure that the increasingly free flow of ideas and information through cyberspace fuels their economies without threatening their political power. — Ian Bremmer

We live in a fantastically wealthy country. We don't have to worry about food. We don't have to worry about clothing. We don't have to worry about our safety. It's very easy for me to be an environmentalist. It's very easy for me to care about making sure that we protect the forests and the whales, and all that stuff. — Ian Bremmer

I think the best way to control a population is to urbanize and to educate women. We have seen historically in many, many countries that once women are educated and have opportunities, and that happens when they live in cities and once they improve their economies, they no longer want to have eight kids. — Ian Bremmer

Everything today is "transient." Technology and its ability to empower actors large and small evolve so quickly that we have to get used to living in a world that exists in a more or less constant state of flux. — Ian Bremmer

I think political science is bad at prediction. We don't gaze into a crystal ball. I do not believe that we predict things. — Ian Bremmer

NASA is increasingly not the future of space exploration. I love the fact that we have private sector folks devoting a lot of money to stimulate innovation in space technology. — Ian Bremmer

Strong states and blocs of strong states are the only source of power and legitimacy capable of driving an international agenda in today's world. — Ian Bremmer

I would rather people not smoke. I certainly appreciate the fact that smoking is not legal in restaurants and bars. That used to stop me from going out at night because you'd go someplace and your clothes would reek and you wouldn't enjoy the experience and that affects your rights. It's always a question. — Ian Bremmer

The real question is not are there other forms of life in the universe, but are there other intelligent forms of life out there right now. Because the universe is not only really big but it's also really long. It's been around for a long time; it's going to be around for a long time. — Ian Bremmer

International institutions like the Security Council, the General Assembly, the G20, the BRICs, the IMF, etc., continue to be little more than an extension of the (increasingly conflicting) values and interests of member states. — Ian Bremmer

Academics were not a challenge when I was fifteen in college. The challenge was figuring out how to fit in socially. — Ian Bremmer

I think it's fantastically narcissistic to believe that in the entire universe, with all of the planetary systems that we've already discovered and the countless others that are out there, that we are the only forms of life. — Ian Bremmer

In China, the state controls the corporations, whereas in the United States, the corporations control the state. — Ian Bremmer

Climate is a global issue. Coal is still the energy that is being used more than anything else to make electricity. The United States is using less as we're turning more to gas. But, around the world, that's what they're using. — Ian Bremmer

I believe that if you go and ask a chief executive of a Goldman Sachs or a BP, and they answer you honestly ... they want monopolies, they want government subsidies, they want preferences - they're not interested in free markets. — Ian Bremmer

The two world wars boosted American power and devastated potential rivals to an extent that could not have lasted more than a few decades. — Ian Bremmer

Whether it is gun control lobby, health care lobby, or abortion, pro-choice lobby, whatever it is, people are always trying to say that it is about restricting rights and they are never really prepared to talk about what the honest tradeoffs are. One of the things we need to do a better job of is actually painting those tradeoffs. — Ian Bremmer

I think that the environment is very a complicated question. I am very sympathetic to people who support the environment who live in the United States. I am very sympathetic to people who don't support the environment who live in a very poor country. — Ian Bremmer

State capitalism is about more than emergency government spending, implementation of more intelligent regulation, or a stronger social safety net. It's about state dominance of economic activity for political gain. — Ian Bremmer

It's foolish to talk of an "Asian century" or an "emerging market century" because events move at a pace that renders this degree of durability obsolete. — Ian Bremmer

The developed world should neither shelter nor militarily destabilize authoritarian regimes unless those regimes represent an imminent threat to the national security of other states. Developed states should instead work to create the conditions most favorable for a closed regime's safe passage through the least stable segment of the J curve however and whenever the slide toward instability comes. And developed states should minimize the risk these states pose the rest of the world as their transition toward modernity begins. — Ian Bremmer

In the nearer term, the likeliest source of risk is a conflict between China and the U.S. These are now the two largest economies in the world, and the combination of their economic interdependence, the sharp differences in their political and economic values, and the growing divergence in their interests makes this relationship potentially dangerous for everyone who might be affected by it - which means pretty much everyone. — Ian Bremmer

Deeper state intervention in an economy means that bureaucratic waste, inefficiency and corruption are more likely to hold back growth. — Ian Bremmer

An emerging market is a country where politics matters at least as much as economics to the market. — Ian Bremmer

Political scientists don't work at banks which is a problem. As political issues become more important for the markets, analysts at banks are asked all sorts of questions they don't have the ability to answer. And if you're getting paid to answer questions as analysts at banks are you never want to be in the position of saying you don't know. — Ian Bremmer

It's very hard for someone who makes $1,000 a year or some who makes less than $1 a day to care about the environment. — Ian Bremmer

I think graffiti is part of Berlin culture. You think about what the Berlin wall meant and how visible that was in everyone's life. How it was a part of their very identity. — Ian Bremmer

There is always the risk that a conflagration in the Middle East becomes larger and more dangerous. In this scenario, we discover that the Arab Spring was merely the prelude to a deeper and much farther-reaching upheaval in the region that has greater impact on countries like Iran and Saudi Arabia. — Ian Bremmer