Autocratic Quotes & Sayings

Who should regulate the media? Who should control the press? The commentariat agonises, as if the choice was between state control through some autocratic press law or a new Press Complaints Commission redecorated with false teeth. But there is another way. Let journalists regulate themselves ... Let's have a little democracy in the media. Even in the Murdoch papers, the number of journalists who are irretrievably lawless and callous is quite small. Most of the disasters at the News of the World happened because its editors treated their staff in the style of Muammar Gaddafi. — Neal Ascherson

Autocratic governments are masters of self-contradiction. They say one thing, do another. — Alastair Reynolds

The trouble with you, M. le comte de Sevigny, is that you're too god-damned autocratic. From now on, you will kindly remember that a good military tactician requires the support of a team. We are your team. — Dorothy Dunnett

In Christianity this evolution lasted centuries; in Bolshevism - only decades. If Lenin was the St. Paul of Marxism, who set out to transplant the movement from its original environment into new lands, Stalin was already its Constantine the Great. He was, to be sure, not the first Emperor to embrace Marxism, but the first Marxist revolutionary to become the autocratic ruler of a vast empire. — Isaac Deutscher

Pinning her wrists on either side of her head, he growled telepathically, Open your legs.
Hunger pulsed. God, she loved it when he got growly and autocratic. Arching in a stretch that rubbed her torso against his, she put her mouth lightly against his and whispered, Make me ... — Thea Harrison

You did the right thing." "Yes, I did." He stroked her cheek with his thumb. "But with you, Arabella Anne Westfall, I have done everything wrong, from the moment we met, at nearly every turn. I have been arrogant and overly confident and short-tempered and deeply, insatiably lustful"-a bystander gasped-"and afraid of this between us. I was everything that must have been abhorrent to you when all you wished was to find your prince charming. Instead you ended up with a blind, surly, autocratic fool. If I could turn back time, if I could so what I should have done-" "Before I fell in love with you?" "-b-before I stole your virtue." His brow cut down. "By God, woman, you will always say what I least expect, won't you?"

-Arabella & Luc — Katharine Ashe

Alice Miller has summed up these rules under the title "Poisonous Pedagogy" in her book For Your Own Good. These rules state: 1. Adults are the masters of the dependent child. 2. They determine in godlike fashion what is right and what is wrong. 3. The child is held responsible for the parents' anger. 4. The parents must always be shielded. 5. The child's life-affirming feelings pose a threat to the autocratic adult. 6. The child's will must be "broken" as soon as possible. 7. All this must happen at a very early age so that the child "won't notice" and will therefore not be able to expose the adult. — John Bradshaw

Wherever autocratic power vanished at an early date - as in the Netherlands and later in England - and the protective interest receded into the background, they swiftly discovered that trade must be free - free to the nethermost recesses of hell. — Joseph Alois Schumpeter

A joy-filled workplace gives people the freedom to use their talents and skills for the benefit of society, without being crushed or controlled by autocratic supervisors. — Dennis W. Bakke

Elizabeth set an example to the monarchs of her day and of subsequent epochs, in that she never arrogated to herself the position of ruler of England, but assumed the more modest role of administrator, of carrier-out of the folk-will, of servitor to the national mission; she understood the trends of the epoch that was emerging from an autocratic regime into a constitutional regime. — Stefan Zweig

The prince in 'The Leopard' was a very complex character - at times autocratic, rude, strong - at times romantic, good, understanding - and sometimes even stupid, and above all, mysterious. — Luchino Visconti

Look, I don't think President Obama would have bowed to the ruler of Saudi Arabia if he didn't have oil to the degree that the Saudis do. I think they and other producing states, almost all of whom, except Norway and Canada, are dictatorships or autocratic systems, have thrown their weight around because of oil. — James Woolsey

Listen, then," says the angry Sophist (Thrasymachus), "I proclaim that might is right, and justice is the interest of the stronger. The different forms of government make laws, democratic, aristocratic, or autocratic, with a view to their respective interests; and these laws, so made by them to serve their interests, they deliver to their subjects as "justice," and punish as "unjust" anyone who transgresses them. — Plato

The judgment, handed down by Judge Ian Chin of the Sarawak High Court, demonstrated astonishing independence from the Malaysian government. Chin knew the price of that independence. After a much-maligned judgment against a politician belonging to the ruling Barisan National government in 1998, he had been verbally threatened by Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, and then enrolled in a five-day boot camp with other judges for "re-educational" purposes. While there, the primacy of the government's interests was hammered into the judicial civil servants.3 Crushing the independence of the courts was done systematically under Mahathir. In 1988, the autocratic Premier had arbitrarily dismissed the country's top judge, Lord President Salleh Abas, thereby keeping the remaining judges on a short lead.4 Even today, in 2014, Malaysia's judges still have difficulty ruling independently when government interests are at stake. — Lukas Straumann

In the Middle Ages, the Roman Catholic papacy developed into an abusive, corrupt, autocratic, totalitarian system by claiming apostolic authority through a supposed line of succession back to Peter. — John F. MacArthur Jr.

Millions of people died in the war "to make the world safe for democracy" - a war that led to autocratic dynasties being replaced by totalitarian dictatorships that slaughtered far more of their own people than the dynasties had? — Thomas Sowell

The Big Book's chapter We Agnostics draws a line in the sand: God either is or He isn't. What was our choice to be (Alcoholics Anonymous, 53)? Nature abhors a vacuum and a state of nothing can't exist in either the material or spiritual world. This kind of binary thinking made sense in the autocratic world of 1939. But in a democratic, pluralist society, all-or-nothing thinking is a cognitive distortion - a philosophical assumption that everything is right or wrong, good or evil, superior or inferior. In this millennium, people can hold opposing views and be equals in the same community. Our Traditions, lovingly and tolerantly, make room for more than one truth. That's a good thing, because the only problem with the truth is that there are so many versions of it. — Joe C.

I have long been aware that when an independent intellectual stands up to an autocratic state, step one toward freedom is often a step into prison. Now I am taking that step; and true freedom is that much nearer. — Liu Xia

I played a lot of leaders, autocratic sorts; perhaps it was my Canadian accent. — Leslie Nielsen

It was as though most managers in the world were primarily interested either in results or in people. The managers who were interested in results often seemed to be labeled "autocratic," while the managers interested in people were often labeled "democratic." The young man thought each of these managers - the "tough" autocrat and the "nice" democrat - were only partially effective. "It's like being half a manager," he thought. — Kenneth H. Blanchard

In times of totalitarian or autocratic rule, music (indeed culture in general) is often the only avenue of independent thought. It is the only way people can meet as equals, and exchange ideas. Culture then becomes primarily the voice of the oppressed and it takes over from politics as a driving force for change. — Daniel Barenboim

An autocratic system of coercion, in my opinion soon degenerates. For force always attract men of low morality. — Albert Einstein

There was a happy irony in the first cousin of the autocratic Kaiser Wilhelm II and Tsar Nicholas II (with whom George bore a striking resemblance) furthering British democracy. — Paul Ham

In America nature is autocratic, saying, I am not arguing, I am telling you. — Erik Erikson

There is a long history of monetary experience. It tells us that government is at heart a counterfeiter and therefore cannot be trusted to control money, and that this is true of both autocratic and popular government. — Garet Garrett

Where there is little or no public opinion, there is likely to be bad government, which sooner or later becomes autocratic government. — William Lyon Mackenzie King

Mind is the wielder of muscles. The force of a hammer blow depends on the energy applied; the power expressed by a man's bodily instrument depends on his aggressive will and courage. The body is literally manufactured and sustained by mind. Through pressure of instincts from past lives, strengths or weaknesses percolate gradually into human consciousness. They express as habits, which in turn ossify into a desirable or an undesirable body. Outward frailty has mental origin; in a vicious circle, the habit-bound body thwarts the mind. If the master allows himself to be commanded by a servant, the latter becomes autocratic; the mind is similarly enslaved by submitting to bodily dictation. — Paramahansa Yogananda

Socialism is socialism. Government run enterprises are just as inept under democratic governments as they are under autocratic governments. — Thomas J. DiLorenzo

A heavy silence as the first sparks of revolution are struck. Sevro comes close. "That was rousing." "Too demokratic?" I whisper. "I don't think autocratic demokracy counts." Sevro wrinkles his nose. "You did threaten to vent them into space." "Threaten? I thought I implied it rather smoothly." "Smooth as gravel, dipshit." Sevro cackles a bit too enthusiastically and slaps his leg with his mech hand, denting the metal there. — Pierce Brown

Degeneracy follows every autocratic system of violence, for violence inevitably attracts moral inferiors. Time has proven that illustrious tyrants are succeeded by scoundrels. — Albert Einstein

We are not subjects of an autocratic King, but are citizens of the country contributing to the advancement of our people who pay taxes out of their hard earned income. — Nilantha Ilangamuwa

You are human, whether your ancestors come from Europe, Asia, Africa, or wherever, shamanism once existed there. We are just attempting to go home to our spiritual roots before the state religions, the agrarian centralized religions rose up with autocratic government and said, 'This is what you're going to believe, these are the official revelations, take it from us, you can trust us, we got it.' — Michael Harner

The Pistons were partly distracted by this short but excitingly fiery chase, and partly distracted by a new threat in the form of a small but enraged Dimity. Dimity, bless her heart, was reciting one of Mademoiselle Geraldine's longest lectures on proper behavior at a dance, finger shaking in autocratic fury, Lord Dingleproops notwithstanding. — Gail Carriger

No central planning, no autocratic rule and no military regime can produce what free man can do. — Tsakhiagiin Elbegdorj

Great leaders are paradoxical. They catalyze, rather control, the work of their teams. They have an overarching vision for the team but are not autocratic in the realization of this vision. Their eyes are open to whatever results occur-not just planned goals, because serendipity is a great innovator. — Guy Kawasaki

Capital requires protection, as do the institutions through which it operates. As capital expands its operations, the state that is associated with its protection must develop its capacity for autocratic control. Thus, the "Free World" increasingly resembles a dreary string of heartless police states. — Michael Parenti

He was awfully good at being aristocratic. Alexia, on the other hand, was only good at being autocratic. Not quite the same thing. — Gail Carriger

In the Middle East, the weak perish quickly and autocratic rule seems to be the most effective governing system to combat extremism and overcome so many tribal, religious, linguistic, and ethnic differences. — Zack Love

Under capitalism, we can't have democracy by definition. Capitalism is a system in which the central institutions of society are in principle under autocratic control. — Noam Chomsky

If we in Asia want to speak credibly for Asian values, we must be prepared to also champion those ideals which are universal and belong to humanity as a whole ... It is altogether shameful, if ingenious, to cite 'Asian values' as an excuse for autocratic practices and the denial of basic rights and civil liberties. — Anwar Ibrahim

Capitalism is a system in which the central institutions of society are, in principle, under autocratic control. Thus, a corporation or an industry is, if we were to think of it in political terms, fascist, that is, it has tight control at the top and strict obedience has to be established at every level ... Just as I'm opposed to political fascism, I am opposed to economic fascism. I think that until the major institutions of society are under the popular control of participants and communities, it's pointless to talk about democracy. — Noam Chomsky

There is a sweetness in being the sole source, the autocratic
and irresponsible cause of the greatest joy and profoundest pain to another. — Ivan Turgenev

In Europe, it appears that in the name of democracy, elites are pursuing an autocratic, centralized power, seeking economic control and social regimentation. — Maggie Gallagher

Democracy is essentially a means, a utilitarian device for safeguarding internal peace and individual freedom. As such it is by no means infallible or certain. Nor must we forget that there has often been much more cultural and spiritual freedom under an autocratic rule than under some democracies and it is at least conceivable that under the government of a very homogeneous and doctrinaire majority democratic government might be as oppressive as the worst dictatorship. — Friedrich Hayek

Yet lost in the debate about America's true intentions in the Middle East was the fact that large majorities in every Muslim-majority state surveyed told pollsters they wanted to see their countries move toward greater democracy. A wave of democratic fervor across the Middle East created a renewed sense of hope for scores of people who had spent their lives in autocratic societies but who now looked forward to the possibility of having a say, even if in the most limited of ways, in their own political destinies. The Green Movement in Iran lit the fuse, employing new social media technologies like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube to break the government's monopoly over the media and to demonstrate to the world their aspiration for freedom and liberty. — Reza Aslan

Despotism has forever had a powerful hold upon the world. Autocratic government, not self-government, has been the prevailing state of mankind. The record of past history is the record, not of the success of republics, but of their failure. — Calvin Coolidge

Pnin slowly walked under solemn pines. The sky was dying. He did not believe in an autocratic God. He did believe, dimly, in a democracy of ghosts. The souls of the dead, perhaps, formed committees, and these, in continuous session, attended the destinies of the quick. — Vladimir Nabokov

A lot of Arabs have proven to themselves that there is an alternative to Bin Laden-ism if they want to do away with the corrupt, autocratic regimes in their countries. — Irshad Manji

Companies used to be able to function with autocratic bosses. We don't live in that world anymore. — Rosabeth Moss Kanter

There are certain narrow, umimaginative, and autocratic old people who seem to call out the most mischievous and sometimes the worst traits in children. — Kate Douglas Wiggin

Popularity is an element in any system, even the most autocratic and regimented, because it is so much easier to count heads or hands than to evaluate excellence. — L.E. Modesitt Jr.

Fashion is aristocratic-autocratic. — J.G. Holland

You can understand Tunisia revolution as a failure to censor the internet. And Libya had that failure too. It's very difficult for governments that are autocratic and don't have broad popular support to be in power when a lot of people have these devices. That was what Arab Spring was about, that people could express this and lead to revolution. — Eric Schmidt

The ram, a huge wooly creature named Hughie, with testicles that hung nearly to the ground like wool-covered footballs, shouldered his massive way into the front rank with a loud and autocratic Bahh! — Diana Gabaldon

This remedy is the power of the citizens; they have to prevent the establishment of such an autocratic regime that arrogates to itself a higher wisdom than that of the average citizen. This is the fundamental difference between freedom and serfdom. — Ludwig Von Mises

The only way, they argued, to prevent a revolution was to rule Russia with an iron hand. This meant defending the autocratic principle, the unchecked powers of the police, the hegemony of the nobility, and the moral domination of the Church, against the liberal and secular challenges of the urban-industrialize order. — Orlando Figes

The seventeenth-century Benedictine mystic, Dom Augustine Baker, who fought a determined battle for the interior liberty of contemplative souls in an age ridden by autocratic directors, has the following to say on the subject: The director is not to teach his own way, nor indeed any determinate way of prayer, but to instruct his disciples how they may themselves find out the way proper for them. . . . In a word, he is only God's usher, and must lead souls in God's way, and not his own. — Thomas Merton

Just as Stalin used alcohol to keep his subordinates divided, fearful, confused, and off balance, so too the Soviet leadership continued a longstanding autocratic tradition of utilizing vodka to keep society in check: drunken, divided (atomized), and unable to mount a challenge to its power.36 The communists, in particular, knew this well. — Anonymous

The president(Obama) comparing him to a kid in the back of a classroom, I think, is very indicative of the president's lack of appreciation of who Vladimir Putin is. He's an old KGB colonel that has no illusions about our relationship, does not care about a relationship with the United States, continues to oppress his people, continues to act in an autocratic fashion. — John McCain

In the midst of Our great grief,' announced Alexander III, 'the voice of God bids Us to stand staunchly for government relying on God's design with faith in the truth of autocratic power. — Simon Sebag Montefiore

How is it that the Church produced no geometer in her autocratic reign of twelve hundred years? — John William Draper

It is possible to see slavery and serfdom merely as extreme early forms of autocratic management, in which employees had no voice whatsoever in the work process and were viewed not as human beings but as alienated forms of individual wealth. Slavery, in this sense, did not die; it continues in modern dress in contemporary organizations wherever managers exercise autocratic power, unequal status, or arbitrary privileges, no matter how scientific the terminology or postmodern the image — Kenneth Cloke

You cannot apply your high standards to a country [Egypt] burdened with decades of autocratic rule. Our democracy is still in its infancy. — Mohamed ElBaradei

I've always been completely autocratic. I've never learned to be diplomatic or democratic. — Alan Parker

It has always astonished me, Georgy Daniilovich, that those who are most repulsed by autocratic or dictatorial rule are among the first to eliminate their enemies once they take on the mantle of power themselves. — John Boyne

A republican government is in a hundred points weaker than one that is autocratic; but in this one point it is the strongest that ever existed-it has educated a race of men that are men. — Henry Ward Beecher

Revolution? You're an idiot. You don't even know what that word means. Forget your precious Mao and Che and Fidel. If they've appeared on a T-shirt, they haven't changed shit. You want revolution, look at Alexander Fleming. Penicillin transformed the world in ways Lenin and Washington only dreamt of. Now sit down and shut up, you autocratic frat boy. It's adult swim. — Marcus Sakey

Our object now, as then, is to vindicate the principles of peace and justice in the life of the world as against selfish and autocratic power, and to set up among the really free and self-governed peoples of the world such a concert of purpose and of action as will henceforth insure the observance of those principles. — Woodrow Wilson

In many countries, schools are preparing students to participate in a democratic environment; yet schools themselves tend to be extremely autocratic, with all high-level decisions being made by adults. — Adora Svitak

Perhaps a revolution can overthrow autocratic despotism and profiteering or power-grabbing oppression, but it can never truly reform a manner of thinking; instead, new prejudices, just like the old ones they replace, will serve as a leash for the great unthinking mass. — Immanuel Kant

Beauty is the greatest of human powers. Any power without counterbalance or control becomes autocratic and leads to abuse and to folly. Despotism in a government is insanity; in woman, fantasy. — Honore De Balzac

Whoopi Goldberg looked like me, she had hair like mine, she was dark like me. I'd been starved for images of myself. I'd grown up watching a lot of American TV. There was very little Kenyan material, because we had an autocratic ruler who stifled our creative expression. — Lupita Nyong'o

Creation, whether it's writing, painting or whatever, is essentially despotic and autocratic in nature, because it's the work of one mind and one mind alone which has absolute power of life or death over this sentence, or that phrase or whatever it is. It brooks no interference and can only work if it's the one mind doing it. Reading, on the other hand, interpretation, is inherently, intrinsically democratic, because it is fundamentally a process of negotiation between the mind and the text, between the expectations you bring to it and the satisfactions and disappointments you take away from it. — Philip Pullman

One writer may speak of something more lasting than Horace Greeley when he writes of that editor that his secular philanthropy drifted into autocratic ambition. — Harold Holzer

Autocratic leadership existed in Russia for many centuries, changing only its ideological colors and method of legitimization. — Lilia Shevtsova

After many unhappy experiments in the direction of an ideal Republic, it was found that what may be described as a Despotism tempered by Dynamite provides, on the whole, the most satisfactory description of ruler - an autocrat who dares not abuse his autocratic power. — W.S. Gilbert

I actually bought the argument that if we democratized Iraq, we could create a space for venting some of the stuff that's going on in the Middle East in these autocratic regimes that is expressing itself through jihadism, because it has nowhere else to express itself. — Andrew Sullivan

The checks and balances is a way to prevent government from either devolving into an autocratic tyranny or an autocratic mob mentality. — Beau Willimon

The US has developed two coordinate governing classes: the one, called 'business,' building cities, manufacturing and distributing goods, and holding complete and autocratic power over the livelihood of millions; the other, called 'government,' concerned with preaching and exemplification of spiritual ideals, so caught in a mass of theory, that when it wished to move in a practical world it had to do so by means of a sub rosa political machine. — Thurman Arnold

Our mass movement will shatter this communal, fascist and autocratic center. — Lalu Prasad Yadav

The country as a whole is far too complex and poor compared to Gujarat, which has been business-friendly and advanced in both governance and physical infrastructure (like roads, ports, etc.) over many decades now. On top of this, Modi's rather high-handed autocratic personal style (which is resented by many even within his own party) does not augur well for the intricate negotiations with diverse groups, state leaders and coalition partners he will necessarily have to work with at the all-India level. His polarising personality is not conducive to the tasks of compromise and consensus-building a leader inevitably faces in a highly fragmented polity like India's. — Anonymous