Self Interest Quotes - Page 13

• I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interests of organisations, specifically banks and others, were such that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders and their equity in the firms.

  Alan Greenspan

  Mistake, Self, Made

  " Greenspan - I was wrong about the economy. Sort of" by Andrew Clark and Jill Treanor, www.theguardian.com. October 23, 2008.

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• The economic distress of America's inner cities may be the most pressing issue facing the nation. The lack of businesses and jobs in disadvantaged urban areas fuels not only a crushing cycle of poverty but also crippling social problems such as drug abuse and crime… A sustainable economic base can be created in the inner city, but only as it has been created elsewhere: through private, for-profit initiatives and investment based on economic self-interest and genuine competitive advantage.

  Michael Porter

  Crush, Jobs, Cities

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• Successful organizing is not built on self-interest but rather on dignity and a sense of purpose.

  Paul Wellstone

  Successful, Self, Purpose

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• The kind of society which we still have is maybe, in some cases, getting worse. Competition is becoming a virtue. Intense competition drives people to go more and more into self-interest. Even to see other folks as competition.

  Major Owens

  Self, People, Competition

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• Under a socialist system every nation will be the supreme arbiter of its own destinies, national and international; will be forced into no alliance against its will, but will have its independence guaranteed and its freedom respected by the enlightened self-interest of the socialist democracy of the world.

  James Connolly

  Destiny, Self, Independence

  James Connolly, Peter Berresford-Ellis (1988). “James Connolly: Selected Writings”, p.34, Pluto Press

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• Self-interest and mutual interest are inextricably linked. National interests can best be advanced through collective action, ... Calculate not just the human misery of the poor themselves. Calculate our loss: The aid, the lost opportunity to trade, the short-term consequences of the multiple conflicts; the long-term consequences on the attitude to the wealthy world of injustice and abject deprivation amongst the poor.

  Tony Blair

  Attitude, Loss, Opportunity

  "Tony Blair's Mansion House speech: full text". www.theguardian.com. November 15, 2005.

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• This is partly a function of approval ratings. People pay attention [to polls] and start saying, 'Lets take a more independent tack.' It is frankly self-interest, self-preservation.

  John Thune

  Independent, Approval Rating, Self

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• It's not a choice between war and peace. It's a choice between war and endless war. It's not appeasement. I think it's better even to call it American self-interest.

  Michael Scheuer

  War, Thinking, Self

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• The cloven-foot of self-interest was now and then to be seen aneath the robe of public principle.

  John Galt

  Self, Feet, Principles

  John Galt (1842). “The Provost: And Other Tales”, p.8, Edinburgh : W. Blackwood

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• Capitalism has destroyed our belief in any effective power but that of self interest backed by force. But even Capitalist cynicism will admit that however unconscionable we may be when our own interests are affected, we can be most indignantly virtuous at the expense of others.

  George Bernard Shaw

  Self, May, Belief

  "The Intelligent Woman's Guide to Socialism and Capitalism". Book by George Bernard Shaw, p. 214, 1928.

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• The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley of ties that bound man to his "natural superiors," and left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous "cash payment.

  Karl Marx

  Men, Self, Hands

  Karl Marx, Lawrence H. Simon (1994). “Marx: Selected Writings”, p.161, Hackett Publishing

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• It's important that we recognize how extreme the Republicans are in almost every case and how against our self-interest it is to vote for them whether or not we are disappointed with the current crew. At least they believe in the Constitution. At least they have an idea of economic justice. The Republicans are devoted to creating more rich folks.

  Gloria Steinem

  Believe, Self, Ideas

  Interview with Max Miller, bigthink.com. October 28, 2010.

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• Iconography becomes even more revealing when processes or concepts, rather than objects, must be depicted for the constraint of a definite "thing" cedes directly to the imagination. How can we draw "evolution" or "social organization," not to mention the more mundane "digestion" or "self-interest," without portraying more of a mental structure than a physical reality? If we wish to trace the history of ideas, iconography becomes a candid camera trained upon the scholar's mind.

  Stephen Jay Gould

  Reality, Self, Organization

  Stephen Jay Gould (2010). “Eight Little Piggies: Reflections in Natural History”, p.428, W. W. Norton & Company

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• Businessmen should not put their finger in politics, because they tend to think only of their own self-interest. But I worry about the low morale in Italian industry and the lack of government initiatives to help the poor.

  Diego Della Valle

  Thinking, Italian, Government

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• Christianity has held back any further advances in human consciousness for the past thousand years. And for the past century it's been in direct conflict with its illegitimate offspring, Communism (again with a capital C). Both ask the individual to sacrifice his self-interest to the higher goals of the organization. (Which is okay by me as long as it's voluntary; but as soon as either becomes too big - and takes on that damned capital C - they stop asking for cooperation and start demanding it.)
  Any higher states of human enlightenment have been sacrificed between these two monoliths.

  David Gerrold

  Sacrifice, Past, Self

  "The Man Who Folded Himself". Book by David Gerrold, 1973.

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• The passions possess a certain injustice and self interest which makes it dangerous to follow them, and in reality we should distrust them even when they appear most trustworthy.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Passion, Reality, Self

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• This was 1990, the year that communism died in Europe and it seemed strange to me that in all the words that were written about the fall of the iron curtain, nobody anywhere lamented that it was the end of a noble experiment. I know that communism never worked and I would have disliked living under it myself but none the less it seems that there was a kind of sadness in the thought that the only economic system that appeared to work was one based on self interest and greed.

  Bill Bryson

  Fall, Sadness, Self

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• In the background lurks the scourge of international terrorism. There are people exercising power in a few countries and leading political factions in others who seem to be moved by narrow, brutal and irrational impulses. Their view of their own self-interest is so blinkered as to leave no space for purely human values, for peaceful negotiation or for economic advancement. They are bent on the destruction of the established order and of civilised ways of doing business. They must never be allowed to succeed.

  Margaret Thatcher

  Country, Exercise, Self

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• The howl of self-interest is loud ... but the heart is black which throbs solely to its note.

  Percy Bysshe Shelley

  Heart, Self, Black

  Percy Bysshe Shelley (1926). “The Complete Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley: Notes on Shelley's correspondents. Letters, 1803 to 1812”

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• We've gotta restore the American people's confidence in the ethics process by ensuring that political self-interest can no longer prevent politicians from enforcing ethics rules.

  Barack Obama

  Self, People, Political

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• The claims of existing social arrangements and of self interest have been duly allowed for. We cannot at the end count them a second time because we do not like the result.

  John Rawls

  Self, Social, Ends

  John Rawls (2009). “A Theory of Justice”, p.117, Harvard University Press

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• By a kind of happy pre-established harmony, such as a later age discovered between the needs of society and the self-interest of the individual, success in business is in itself almost a sign of spiritual grace, for it is a proof that a man has laboured faithfully in his vocation.

  R. H. Tawney

  Spiritual, Men, Self

  R. H. Tawney (2016). “Religion and the Rise of Capitalism”, p.210, Verso Books

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• With the more endowed nations constrained by their own higher technological capacity for self-destruction as well as by self interest, war may have become a luxury that only the poor peoples of this world can afford.

  Zbigniew Brzezinski

  War, Luxury, Self

  Zbigniew Brzezinski (2007). “The Grand Chessboard”, p.199, Basic Books

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• The most altruistic and sustainable philosophies fail before the brute brain stem imperative of self-interest.

  Peter Watts

  Philosophy, Self, Brain

  Peter Watts (2006). “Blindsight”, p.48, Macmillan

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• In a nuclear age, and in an age of serious environmental degradation, apocalyptic belief creates a serious second order danger. The precarious logic of self-interest that saw us through the Cold War would collapse if the leaders of one nuclear state came to welcome, or ceased to fear mass death.

  Ian Mcewan

  War, Self, Order

  "The day of judgment, part two" by Ian McEwan, www.theguardian.com. May 31, 2008.

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