Democracy | Some revealing quotes

"Equality today means ‘sameness’, rather than ‘oneness’." Erich Fromm

"ANARCHY, or the government of each man by himself or as the English say, self -government." Pierre-Joseph Proudhon

"A democracy which fails to concentrate authority in an emergency inevitably falls into such confusion that the ground is prepared for the rise of a dictator." Walter Lippmann

"We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society." Edward Bernays

"One of the most interesting reactions to come out of 1968 was in the first publication of the Trilateral Commission, which believed there was a 'crisis of democracy' from too much participation of the masses." Noam Chomsky

"If you go to one demonstration and then go home, that's something, but the people in power can live with that. What they can't live with is sustained pressure that keeps building, organisations that keep doing things, people that keep learning lessons from the last time and doing it better the next time." Noam Chomsky

"It is foolishly thought by some that democratical constitutions will not, cannot, last; that the States will quarrel with each other; that a king, or at least a nobility, are indispensable for the prosperity of a nation." Lafayette

"The more I see, hear, and think in Europe, the more I wish for every measure that can ensure to the United States dignity, power, and public confidence." Lafayette

"I do not believe that the solution to our problem is simply to elect the right people. The important thing is to establish a political climate of opinion which will make it politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing. Unless it is politically profitable for the wrong people to do the right thing, the right people will not do the right thing either, or it they try, they will shortly be out of office." Milton Friedman

"Popular government has not yet been proved to guarantee, always and everywhere, good government." Walter Lippmann

"That rifle hanging on the wall of the working-class flat or labourer's cottage is the symbol of democracy. It is our job to see that it stays there." George Orwell

"By asserting the unity of the human race, we also oppose every unpleasant assumption of higher and lower human races. There are more teachable, more highly educated, spiritually cultivated, refined peoples, but no nobler tribes. All are equally destined for freedom; freedom, which in more primitive states belongs to the individual, and in state life, with the enjoyment of political institutions, belongs to the community as a right." Alexander von Humboldt

"It's heartbreaking that so many hundreds of millions of people around the world are desperate for the right to vote, but here in America people stay home on election day." Moby

"The next time some academics tell you how important diversity is, ask how many Republicans there are in their sociology department." Thomas Sowell