Institutions And Democracy Quotes & Sayings

. And it especially cannot endure when powerful groups in that society seek at every turn to undermine and destroy its very being. The threats to democracy are not always from enemies abroad. They can come from those within who espouse the language of democracy and use the liberties afforded them by democratic institutions to undermine the substance of democracy. Weimar cautions us to be wary of those people as well. What comes next can be very bad, even worse than imaginable. — Eric D. Weitz

Democracy as a promise means that society can never be just enough and that the self-reflection and struggles that enable all members of the community to participate in the decisions and institutions that shape their lives must be continually debated, safeguarded, and preserved at all costs. — Henry Giroux

When free discussion is denied, hardening of the arteries of democracy has set in, free institutions are but a lifeless form, and the death of the republic is at hand. — William Randolph Hearst

The International Criminal Court, like most international institutions, is a wonderful idea. A noble idea. All it needs to work is planetary government, worldwide democracy and the triumph of reason over tribal loyalties, political doctrines and individual ambition. In other words, it requires that we all live in the world described by the "Star Trek" television shows. — James Lileks

I intend to do what I can, working with my congressional colleagues, Republicans and Democrats, to help bring about the changes to the practices and institutions of our democracy that they want and deserve. — John McCain

Unlike national markets, which tend to be supported by domestic regulatory and political institutions, global markets are only 'weakly embedded'. There is no global lender of last resort, no global safety net, and of course, no global democracy. In other words, global markets suffer from weak governance, and are therefore prone to instability, inefficiency, and weak popular legitimacy. — Dani Rodrik

But there is nothing idealized or romantic about the difference between a society whose arrangements roughly serve all its citizens (something otherwise known as social justice) and one whose institutions have been converted into a stupendous fraud. That can be the difference between democracy and plutocracy. — Bill Moyers

We Chileans have to be able to understand that in a democracy institutions must function freely and with sovereignty. — Ricardo Lagos

For those people who are going to tune in strictly for the pyrotechnics, we have better and bigger explosions. That's a prerequisite of any sequel. But in terms of this, what we're really monitoring is watching the gas industry light our institutions, light our regulatory agencies, light our democracy on fire. — Josh Fox

The philanthropic tradition is older than democracy, older than Christianity, and older than higher education. It gives form and purpose to personal and social life that cannot be provided by the self-interest of economic enterprise or required by the mandate of political institutions. — Robert L. Payton

I believe in democracy - in its indisputable achievements and its unfulfilled promise. I believe in American political institutions - in the genius inherent in their design and in the undeniable good they have done when put to their best use. I believe in the power of the human heart - in its capacity for truth and justice, love and forgiveness. — Parker J. Palmer

I believe in a relatively equal society, supported by institutions that limit extremes of wealth and poverty. I believe in democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law. That makes me a liberal, and I'm proud of it. — Paul Krugman

In an absolutism, the autocrat is visible and tangible. The real despotism of republican institutions is far deeper, more insidious, because it rests on the popular delusion of self-government and independence. That is the subtle source of democratic tyranny, and, as such, it cannot be reached with a bullet. — Alexander Berkman

Deficit reduction is the demand of the financial institutions and the superrich, and in a rapidly declining democracy, that's what counts. — Noam Chomsky

Pakistan's future viability, stability and security lie in empowering its people and building political institutions. My goal is to prove that the fundamental battle for the hearts and minds of a generation can be accomplished only under democracy. — Benazir Bhutto

Democracy is only good for a society where individuals are educated and have the ability to differentiate right from wrong without any influences from the outside. India is the biggest democracy in the world, yet, why is it so venal, divided and poor? America is the greatest democracy of the world, yet, it only has two main political parties, which are heavily influenced by lobbyists from religious groups, and powerful institutions like businesses, trade unions and think-tanks. In contrast, China is a nation ruled by one party, yet it has prospered during the last three decades, which is nothing less than a miracle. No other country on earth has ever achieved that feat. No system is good or bad for all. I am not saying democracy is bad, but it is not good for all. It can be good or bad for certain periods of time, circumstances and societies. There is no such thing as one idea fits all."

FROM MY NO.7 BOOK COMING SOON.... — Tim I. Gurung

Our mission is not to impose our peculiar institutions upon other nations by physical force or diplomatic treachery but rather by internal peace and prosperity to solve the problem of self-government and reconcile democratic freedom with national stability. — Benjamin Harrison

Far from being the product of a democratic revolution and of an opposition to English institutions, the constitution of the United States was the result of a powerful reaction against democracy, and in favor of the traditions of the mother country. — John Acton

There is an urgent need to-day for the citizens of a democracy to think well. It is not enough to have freedom of the Press and parliamentary institutions. Our difficulties are due partly to our own stupidity, partly to the exploitation of that stupidity, and partly to our own prejudices and personal desires. — Susan Stebbing

Democracy has always been in crisis: democracy is all about practicing the art of bearable dissatisfaction. In democratic societies, people often complain about their leaders and their institutions. The gap between the ideal democracy and the existing one cannot be bridged. — Ivan Krastev

From these activists we can learn a crucial lesson: without citizens creating the institutions necessary for facilitating the growth of public deliberation, democracy will be a meaningless term. Without political leaders articulating this idea and acting upon it, public life and citizenship will continue to stagnate. — Kevin Mattson

Three circumstances seem to me to contribute more than all others to the maintenance of the democratic republic in the United States.
The first is that federal form of government which the Americans have adopted, and which enables the Union to combine the power of a great republic with the security of a small one.
The second consists in those township institutions which limit the despotism of the majority and at the same time impart to the people a taste for freedom and the art of being free.
The third is to be found in the constitution of the judicial power. I have shown how the courts of justice serve to repress the excesses of democracy, and how they check and direct the impulses of the majority without stopping its activity. — Alexis De Tocqueville

The Catholic Church then owed its popularity to the widespread popular skepticism which saw in the republic and in democracy the loss of all order, security, and political will. To many the hierarchic system of the Church seemed the only escape from chaos. Indeed, it was this, rather than any religious revivalism, which caused the clergy to be held in respect.39 As a matter of fact, the staunchest supporters of the Church at that period were the exponents of that so-called "cerebral" Catholicism, the "Catholics without faith," who were henceforth to dominate the entire monarchist and extreme nationalist movement. Without believing in their other-worldly basis, these "Catholics" clamored for more power to all authoritarian institutions. This, indeed, had been the line first laid down by Drumont and later endorsed by Maurras.40 — Hannah Arendt

Libraries are more than community centers, just as librarians do more than answer questions you could easily ask Google. From the opening of the BPL, the first public library, to the expansion of public libraries across America through the Carnegie libraries, the library as an institution has been fundamental to the success of our democracy. Libraries provide access to the skills and knowledge necessary to fulfill our role as active citizens. Libraries also function as essential equalizing institutions in our society. For as long as a library exists in most communities, staffed with trained librarians, it remains true that individuals' access to our shared culture is not dictated by however much money they have. — John Palfrey

Under the notion that unregulated market-driven values and relations should shape every domain of human life, the business model of governance has eviscerated any viable notion of social responsibility while furthering the criminalization of social problems and cutbacks in basic social services, especially for young people, the elderly, people of color, and the impoverished.36 At this historical juncture there is a merging of violence and governance along with the systemic disinvestment in and breakdown of institutions and public spheres that have provided the minimal conditions for democracy. This becomes obvious in the emergence of a surveillance state in which social media not only become new platforms for the invasion of privacy but further legitimate a culture in which monitoring functions are viewed as both necessary and benign. Meanwhile, the state-sponsored society of hyper-fear increasingly regards each and every person as a potential terrorist suspect. — Henry A. Giroux

We must remember that democracy works when given time to develop, mature and deliver. People must have access to information for informed debate. Government institutions must treat citizens fairly, and with dignity, while responding to their needs. — Atifete Jahjaga

Democracy is a revelation, but it's complicated. There are elections to hold, politics to create, rights to assert, grievances to settle and institutions to build. To many, it's exhilarating. For others, it can be disappointing when it turns out that democracy doesn't immediately make life better. — Atifete Jahjaga

The role of the press and the protections which we afford it are today more important than ever before, because we dwell in a society where belief in our governments and in the strength of our institutions is declining. — Rose Bird

Observing the volatile nature of the new democracies, I came vividly to see how unimportant a part of democracy are elections, in comparison with the enduring institutions and public spirit that make elected politicians accountable. — Roger Scruton

But our democratic institutions are not automated. They must be inhabited by citizens and citizen leaders who know how to hold conflict inwardly in a manner that converts it into creativity, allowing it to pull them open to new ideas, new courses of action, and each other. That kind of tension-holding is the work of the well-tempered heart: if democracy is to thrive as that restored prairie is thriving, our hearts and our institutions must work in concert. — Parker J. Palmer

In Latin America, specialists and polling organisations have, for some time, observed that the extension of formal democracy was accompanied by an increasing disillusionment about democracy and a lack of faith in democratic institutions. — Noam Chomsky

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. — Arlen Specter

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

Our fathers and grandfathers who poured over the Midwest were self-reliant, rugged, God-fearing people of indomitable courage ... They asked only for freedom of opportunity and equal chance. In these conceptions lies the real basis of American democracy. They and their fathers give a genius to American institutions that distinguished our people from any other in the world. — Herbert Hoover

The real origin of the democratic spirit - and most likely, many democratic institutions - lies precisely in those spaces of improvisation just outside the control of governments and organized churches. — David Graeber

The end of democracy and the defeat of the American Revolution will occur when government falls into the hands of lending institutions and moneyed incorporations. — Thomas Jefferson

In a democracy scientific institutions, research programmes, and suggestions must therefore be subjected to public control, there must be a separation of state and science just as there is a separation between state and religious institutions, and science should be taught as one view among many and not as the one and only road to truth and reality. — Paul Karl Feyerabend

The Greek city-states politicised citizen and subject, creating institutions that were way ahead of anything in China or India. The politicians of antiquity exercised a political and military, if not economic, hegemony on the culture as a whole. The idea of democracy was first born and practised here. — Tariq Ali

In my opinion the main evil of the present democratic institutions of the United States does not arise, as is often asserted in Europe, from their weakness, but from their overpowering strength; and I am not so much alarmed at the excessive liberty which reigns in that country as at the very inadequate securities which exist against tyranny. — Alexis De Tocqueville

Every profession has an ideology and a drive for power that goes far beyond its achievements and it is the task of democracy to keep this ideology and this drive under control. Science is here no different from other institutions. — Paul Feyerabend

Collective freedom is one devoid of material bondage and one that supports the institutions necessary for democracy. — Henry Giroux

The government system we have now is set up just like that of Rome and is changing into a system I call Corpocracism (Babylon, United States). Corpocracism is a word derived from some entities of feudalism, democracy, capitalism, classism, and corporatism to form a government system into a dictatorship and police state. This system is being brought about by a group of people in our own government, corporations, financial institutions and foreign entities. It is an ideology of hypocrisy that is leading to an JerUSAlem (America) that will sale off every aspect of its nations people to be captive to foreign entities such as corporations, governments, lawyers, financial institutions, banks, individuals and groups of individuals. — Brian David Mattson

If we care about universal principles such as freedom, democracy and the rule of law, we cannot leave them to the care of market forces; we must establish some other institutions to safeguard them. — George Soros

When economics is regarded as 'the most important key to every lock of every door,' it is only natural that the worth of man should come to be decided largely, even wholly, by his effectiveness as an economic tool.8 This is at variance with the vision of a world where economic, political and social institutions work to serve man, instead of the other way round; where culture and development coalesce to create an environment in which human potential can be realized to the full. The differing views ultimately reflect differences in how the valuation of the various components of the social and national entity are made; how such basic concepts as poverty, progress, culture, freedom, democracy and human rights are defined and, of crucial importance, who has the power to determine such values and definitions. The — Suu Kyi, Aung San

The most effective way to restrict democracy is to transfer decision-making from the public arena to unaccountable institutions: kings and princes, priestly castes, military juntas, party dictatorships, or modern corporations. — Noam Chomsky

Democracy is a great institution and, therefore, it is liable to be greatly abused. — Mahatma Gandhi

If we are to build grassroots respect for the institutions and processes that constitute democracy, the state must treat its citizens as real citizens rather than as subjects. — Mo Ibrahim

I have an intellectual inclination for democratic institutions, but I am instinctively an aristocrat, which means that I despise and fear the masses. I passionately love liberty, legality, the respect for rights, but not democracy ... liberty is my foremost passion. That is the truth. — Alexis De Tocqueville

If the maladministration of the democracy ever brings about a revolutionary crisis, and if monarchical institutions ever become practicable in the United States, the truth of what I advance will become obvious. — Alexis De Tocqueville

India experienced the traditional state-building process in reverse order: unlike Europe, for instance, India instituted full democracy and then set about building a state. Much of the West did precisely the opposite. As a result, underdeveloped institutions have been the Achilles' heel of Indian democracy from the outset. — Milan Vaishnav

Civilizations are illusions, but these illusions are pervasive, dangerous, and powerful. They contribute to globalization's brutality. They allow us, for example, to say that we believe in global free markets and, in the same breath, to discount as impossible the global free movement of labor; to claim that we believe in democracy and human equality, and yet to stymie the creation of global institutions based on one-person-one-vote and equality before the law. — Mohsin Hamid

For every African state, like Ghana, where democratic institutions seem secure, there is a Mali, a Cote d'Ivoire, and a Zimbabwe, where democracy is in trouble. — Michael Ignatieff

I'd rather have the influence than the power, and the influence to me is to build institutions of independence and democracy, to regain for Egypt prestige in education and science and technology. — Ahmed Zewail

The Four Black Boxes To demonstrate that Western institutions have indeed degenerated, I am going to have to open up some long-sealed black boxes. The first is the one labelled 'democracy'. The second is labelled 'capitalism'. The third is 'the rule of law'. And the fourth is 'civil society'. Together, — Niall Ferguson

What if good institutions were in fact the product of good intentions? What if the cynicism that is supposed to be rigor and the acquisitiveness that is supposed to be realism are making us forget the origins of the greatness we lay claim to - power and wealth as secondary consequences of the progress of freedom, or, as Whitman would prefer, Democracy? — Marilynne Robinson

The United States inherited a seemingly inexhaustible fortune in natural resources, yet it has responded to its environment with a dismaying mixture of materialism and inertia. The nation was virtually founded upon a ubiquitous desire for access to land and its contents. Its amazing growth during the nineteenth century was based directly upon the exploitation - immediate, unplanned, full use of soils, minerals, forests, and rivers. Equitable access to these natural bounties rather than constitutional guarantees would be the practical basis for democracy. Subsequently, political institutions were shaped in such a way that they could facilitate the disposition of the public domain. But that expectation, as later generations ruefully observed, did not materialize. The combination of economics and government had instead produced a handful of owners and policy makers who were beyond the control of the ballot box. — Elmo Richardson

But *why* do clean torture and democracy appear to go hand in hand? This is an important puzzle (though by no means the only one suggested by the data). My explanation for this pattern generally is this: Public monitoring leads institutions that favor painful coercion to use and combine clean torture techniques to evade detection, and, to the extent that public monitoring is not only greater in democracies, but that public monitoring of human rights is a core value in modern democracies, it is the case that where we find democracies torturing today we will also be more likely to find stealthy torture. — Darius M. Rejali

America's libraries are the fruits of a great democracy. They exist because we believe that memory and truth are important. They exists because we believe that information an knowledge are not the exclusive domain of a certain type or class of person but rather the province of all who seek to learn. A democratic society holds these institutions in high regard. — Robert S Martin

The Greeks who rhapsodized about democracy in their rhetoric rarely created democratic institutions. A few cities such as Athens occasionally attempted a system vaguely akin to democracy for a few years. These cities functioned as slave societies and were certainly not egalitarian or democratic in the Indian sense. — Jack Weatherford

Our experience shows - and survey after survey reveals - institutions are run better, communities are healthier when women are involved in solving the challenges of our society. Equal representation does not just lead to good democracy: it is democracy. — Cherie Blair

If the country is to survive as a democracy it will depend on voters who understand how our political institutions have evolved and the events that went into their creation. A nation's sense of its history is indistinguishable from its social cohesion. — Alan Bullock

Certainly, if we believe in democracy and democratic systems, when [Benazir Bhutto] failed to pass any legislation, really, at all in her first two years in government during her first term and in fact had a tenure that was marked not only by gross corruption but by human rights abuses, that should have been a time for people to say, "Well, OK, we've given you an opportunity and you haven't bettered the institutions, you haven't strengthened the democratic cause - we may not vote you back." — Fatima Bhutto

Democracy must stand or fall on a platform of possible human perfectibility. If human nature cannot be improved by institutions, democracy is at best a more than usually safe form of political organization ... But if it is to work better as well as merely longer, it must have some leavening effect on human nature; and the sincere democrat is obliged to assume the power of the leaven. [Progressive] — Herbert Croly

Our form of government does not enter into rivalry with the institutions of others. Our government does not copy our neighbors', but is an example to them. It is true that we are called a democracy, for the administration is in the hands of the many and not of the few. But while there exists equal justice to all and alike in their private disputes, the claim of excellence is also recognized; and when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit — Pericles

New Englanders began the Revolution not to institute reforms and changes in the order of things, but to save the institutions and customs that already had become old and venerable with them; and were new only to a few stupid Englishmen a hundred and fifty years behind the times. — Edward Pearson Pressey

The legitimacy of coercive acts in a democracy arises from the process by which they are justified and by the degree to which we regard decisions as rational. If the justifications proceed properly, through recognized public institutions, and if they make sense to us, they are legitimate. — Michael Ignatieff

Democracy, to maintain itself, must repeatedly conquer every cell and corner of the nation. How many of our public institutions and private businesses, our schools, hospitals, and domestic hearths are in reality little fascist states where freedom of speech is more rigorously excluded than vermin? — Jacques Barzun

Dr. King's leadership reaffirmed the promise of our democracy: that everyday people, working together, have the power to change our government and our institutions for the better. — Maria Cantwell

What you're seeing is a loss of confidence in institutions and their legitimacy because they are not seen as delivering. It's hardly a surprise that it's producing a degree of paralysis. Politics becomes very reactive and it's hard to deal with the bigger issues. — Jonathan Wood

We have been deformed by educational and religious institutions that treat us as members of an audience instead of actors in a drama, so we become adults who treat democracy as a spectator sport. — Parker Palmer

Institutions work this way. A son is murdered by the police, and nothing is done. The institutions send the victim's family on a merry-go-round, going from one agency to another, until they wear out and give up. this is a very effective way to beat down poor and oppressed people, who do not have the time to prosecute their cases. Time is money to poor people. To go to Sacramento means loss of a day's pay - often a loss of job. If this is a democracy, obviously it is a bourgeois democracy limited to the middle and upper classes. Only they can afford to participate in it. — Huey Newton

Minor segments of earlier history may have been rescued or 'retrieved' -- e.g. Greek 'democracy,' Aristotle, the Magna Carta, etc. -- but these remain subservient, if not instrumental, to the imperatives of the modern historical narrative and to the progress of 'Western civilization.' African and Asia, in most cases, continue to struggle in order to catch up, in the process not only forgoeing the privilege of drawing on their own traditions and historical experiences that shaped who they were and, partly, who they have become but also letting themselves be drawn into devastating wars, poverty, disease and the destruction of their natural environment. Modernity, whose hegemonic discourse is determined by the institutions and intellectuals of the powerful modern West, has not offered a fair shake to two-thirds of the world's population, who have lost their history and, with it, their organic ways of existence. — Wael B. Hallaq

According to Piketty, if r remains at its historical rate of about 5 percent, then all the negative developments related to the inequality from the 19th century will be repeated. These will include disrespect for working people; worshiping of people who do not work and enjoy leisurely life by living at the expense of other people's labor; political acts that disdain equal opportunity and deny democracy; and opportunities for the rich to buy politicians. What logical conclusion can be made from Piketty's research? If this development continues, then by the end of the 21st century, the world's wealth may become the property of a few enormously rich individuals and institutions. Then, 99.9 percent of humans will end up working for a small number of oligarchs, who will accumulate their wealth by virtue of heredity instead of earning it based on merit. — I.K. Mullins

Democracy no longer means what it was meant to. It has been taken back into the workshop. Each of its institutions has been hollowed out, and it has been returned to us as a vehicle for the free market, of the corporations. For the corporations, by the corporations. — Arundhati Roy

Human beings act in a great variety of irrational ways, but all of them seem to be capable, if given a fair chance, of making a reasonable choice in the light of available evidence. Democratic institutions can be made to work only if all concerned do their best to impart knowledge and to encourage rationality. But today, in the world's most powerful democracy, the politicians and the propagandists prefer to make nonsense of democratic procedures by appealing almost exclusively to the ignorance and irrationality of the electors. — Aldous Huxley

The country is headed toward a single and splendid government of an aristocracy founded on banking institutions and moneyed incorporations and if this tendency continues it will be the end of freedom and democracy, the few will be ruling ... I hope we shall ... crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our government to trial and bid defiance to the laws of our country. I sincerely believe that banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies. — Thomas Jefferson

But when the group is literally capable of changing our perceptions, and when to stand alone is to activate primitive, powerful, and unconscious feelings of rejection, then the health of these institutions seems far more vulnerable than we think. — Susan Cain

For any young democracy, the most difficult but important step is burying the legacy of tyranny and establishing an economy and a government and institutions that abide by the rule of law. Every country faces challenges to the rule of law, including my own. — Joe Biden