Civil Society Quotes - Page 4

• It is the duty of every man to render to the Creator such homage and such only as he believes to be acceptable to him. This duty is precedent, both in order of time and in degree of obligation, to the claims of Civil Society.

  James Madison

  Religious, Believe, Men

  James Madison, Ralph Ketcham “Selected Writings of James Madison”, Hackett Publishing

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• An initiative was essentially led by civil society because the policy of the government was that Africans must not be taught to graze in pastures which were reserved for the main white group.

  Nelson Mandela

  Government, White, Groups

  Source: www.mott.org

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• Most writers in Mexico have had posts as ambassadors, secretaries - that is no longer the case. Now a writer can live off writing. He has an audience: there are publishing houses, there are newspapers - so the situation is not as terrible as it used to be when there were no means and he had to go into government service, be an ambassador or a cabinet minister, etc. So, things are changing in the sense that the civil society is now the protagonist. The writer therefore occupies a different position, but no less influential than in the past, in a new, democratic society.

  Carlos Fuentes

  Writing, Mean, Past

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• Democracy is disruptive... there is no right in a democratic civil society to be free of disruption.

  Naomi Wolf

  Democracy, Politics, Disruption

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• [T]he task of abolishing the essence of Jewry is in truth the task of abolishing Jewry in civil society, abolishing the inhumanity of today's practice of life, the summit of which is the money system.

  Karl Marx

  Essence, Practice, Tasks

  Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels (1975). “The holy family”, p.148, Рипол Классик

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• I think that my emergence as a leader is closely related to the development of Taiwan's democracy. Taiwan's democracy was a gradual development. It was done from the bottom up. Therefore a lot of the more successful political leaders come from civil society, those that are closer to the grass-roots level of the public.

  Tsai Ing-wen

  Successful, Thinking, Leader

  Source: www.washingtonpost.com

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• I was in civil society long before I was ever in politics or my husband was ever even elected president.

  Hillary Clinton

  Husband, Long, President

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• Africa needs help, no question about that but I'd rather prefer that the money is channeled. That's what I call smart aid; it's channeled through African civil society groups. These are the groups which can be held more accountable. These are the groups which will sort of monitor how the aid money is spent.

  George W. Bush

  Smart, Helping, Aids

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• In the past when money was given from government to government, there was no accountability, especially the World Bank loans. Nobody was held accountable for the misuse of World Bank loans. That is why it is important to channel some of the money through civil society groups.

  George W. Bush

  Past, Accountability, Important

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• Where there is an absence of international political leadership, civil society should step in to fill the gap, providing the energy and vision needed to move the world in a new and better direction.

  Daisaku Ikeda

  Moving, Political, Vision

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• I hope I can tell you what happened in Europe and support you in your fight to preserve freedom for your children and your grandchildren, and tell them what I believe the Islamic threat is, and to discuss it with anybody - also people who don't agree with me. This is democracy. This is civil society. We should cherish that.

  Geert Wilders

  Children, Believe, Islamic

  Source: www.parlementairemonitor.nl

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• Regarding African education in this country, there was a time when the government took no interest whatsoever in African education. It was the churches, that part of civil society, which bought land, built schools, and employed and paid teachers. People like myself, right from grade eight up to university, I was in missionary schools.

  Nelson Mandela

  Country, Teacher, School

  Source: www.mott.org

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• The beginning of civilisation is the discovery of some useful arts, by which men acquire property, comforts, or luxuries. The necessity or desire of preserving them leads to laws and social institutions. The discovery of peculiar arts gives superiority to particular nations ... to subjugate other nations, who learn their arts, and ultimately adopt their manners;- so that in reality the origin as well as the progress and improvement of civil society is founded in mechanical and chemical inventions.

  Humphry Davy

  Art, Science, Reality

  Sir Humphry Davy (1840). “Salmonia: or, Days of fly-fishing; in a series of conversations: with some account of the habits of fishes belonging to the genus Salmo. Consolation in travel, or, The last days of a philosopher”, p.351

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• It is on balance desirable to encourage Universal Jurisdiction, and to create pressure from below to make application of such jurisdiction as consistent as possible. I think this will act as a deterrent in some situations, although this impact will never be acknowledged by those affected as it would only embolden civil society to intensify its pressures.

  Richard A. Falk

  Thinking, Impact, Balance

  Source: www.counterpunch.org

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• Often vastly more important, international agreements are not routinely published in draft form or publicly debated, and civil society organizations and ordinary citizens often learn of important global institutional design decisions only after they have already been finalized and adopted. The only reliable way to be kept informed and to exert timely influence is by lobbying and paying the politicians and their negotiators.

  Thomas Pogge

  Agreement, Organization, Design

  Source: www.truth-out.org

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• Every government has signed up to a voluntary legal commitment under at least one of the international covenants and conventions based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But who is holding them to account? Our mission is to make it known that these conventions are good tools for civil society to hold their local authority, their government and businesses accountable.

  Mary Robinson

  Commitment, Rights, Government

  Source: www.who.int

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• Here's the positive scenario: that something has been going wrong in American society. You see it in wage growth, opioid abuse, many other social indicators, as you know. Sometimes it's better to get the bad reaction to that over with quickly while your civil society still is strong and you can react and respond and protest, and you know, four or eight years from now, make another decision, and maybe it's better to have that happen in 2017 than 20 years later when some of our problems are worse and our national mood is worse.

  Tyler Cowen

  Strong, Decision, Abuse

  "A leading economist explains why Trump is a 'placebo president'". Interview with Josh Barro, www.businessinsider.com. March 13, 2017.

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• The social [media channel] isn't about beauty contests and popularity contests. They're a distortion, a caricature of the real thing. It's about trust, connection, and community. That's what there's too little of in today's mediascape, despite all the hoopla surrounding social tools. The promise of the Internet wasn't merely to inflate relationships, without adding depth, resonance, and meaning. It was to fundamentally rewire people, communities, civil society, business, and the state — through thicker, stronger, more meaningful relationships. That's where the future of media lies.

  Umair Haque

  Meaningful, Lying, Real

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• If civil society has nobody who protects the law, then what kind of society is that?

  Ai Weiwei

  Law, Kind, Protect

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• The short interregnum of civil society built on the ruins of the Bastille came to its end with the establishment of the Jews as the new Priestly caste. The alternative Church of our society, the Jews, survived in abeyance for hundreds of years. As long as the Christian Church attended to the discourse, the Jews plainly had no chance to compete; but when its power was broken by liberty-seekers, the alternative arrangement came forward.

  Israel Shamir

  Christian, Years, Long

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• Drafts of domestic legislation must be published, debated and publicly voted on, which gives ample opportunities to civil society organizations and ordinary citizens to at least understand what's being proposed and to voice and to organize opposition before the decision is made.

  Thomas Pogge

  Opportunity, Organization, Voice

  Source: www.truth-out.org

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• Any move by Israel to end the conflict with the Palestinians by unilateral moves - such as annexing the West Bank, delinking Gaza and declaring that there be no further diplomatic process - will lead to strong regional and global reactions, as well as intensify efforts at the UN and in civil society to brand Israel as an outlaw state dangerous to regional and world peace and guilty of criminal behavior.

  Richard A. Falk

  Strong, Moving, Israel

  Source: www.truth-out.org

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• If we have isolated individuals able to inflict enormous harm, imagine what a single lunatic can do with a nuclear weapon. I think the whole base of civil society is at risk.

  Joshua Lederberg

  Thinking, Risk, Able

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• Even if a civil society were to be dissolved by the consent of all its members (e.g., if a people inhabiting an island decided to separate and disperse throughout the world), the last murderer remaining in prison would first have to be executed, so that each has done to him what his deeds deserve and blood guilt does not cling to the people for not having insisted upon this punishment; for otherwise the people can be regarded as collaborators in his public violation of justice.

  Immanuel Kant

  Blood, Punishment, Islands

  Immanuel Kant, Mary J. Gregor (1999). “Practical Philosophy”, p.474, Cambridge University Press

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• I think there is a richness that we enjoy from the diversity that comes from people coming from around the world. And I'm not opposed or afraid of immigrants. I just would like to see us follow the law. I think that gives everybody a clear roadmap on how we should operate as a civil society.

  Jack Williams

  Thinking, Law, Giving

  "What Happens When U.S. Immigration Rules Tighten? Let's Look To Alabama", kmuw.org. March 8, 2017.

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