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Power

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“Many of the wealth holders... aim to translate their economic power into political power... [A]nother measure is the cost of winning ...has been growing also, showing a greater demand for these positions and greater willingness to spend money...”
Peter Turchin (born 1957) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Men like me, we are necessary because we unite those we recruit to keep us in power, and we unite those who have been recruited to put different versions of us in power. It is just like Woody Allen says, in a revolution oppressors become oppressed and vice versa.”
Imad Rahman wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Power to the people" does not mean a government or political party to rule in their name, but social and political power in the hands of the people themselves.”
Lorenzo Kom'boa Ervin (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I believe in the power of ideas. I believe in the power of sharing knowledge.”
Ory Okolloh (born 1977) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“No man has a surplus of power: meaning by power— time, talents, money, influence.”
Fowell Buxton (1837–1915) first seen 1826 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to A Clergyman, Cromer Hall, 22 August 1826, quoted in Memoirs of Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, p. 154.
“Wealth is... political power... and that's how we got from a democracy, to an oligarchy, to a plutocracy. Economists forgot completely about the need for countervailing power... and the oligarchs have taken over...”
John Komlos (born 1944) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Power is the ability to control the action or thought of others. ...The oligarchs use their power also to control the thinking. They invested heavily... to control the thinking of the population.”
John Komlos (born 1944) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“GBV is a huge issue on our continent and in a world where patriarchal power structures still dominate. Male leadership is still seen as the norm, and men hold the majority of power. Patriarchy is a social and political system that treats men as superior to women – where women cannot protect their bodies, meet their basic needs, participate fully in society.”
Basetsana Kumalo (born 1974) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A sinful world creates many false kingdoms around its own selfishness. Sin, no less than despotic reigns in the past, has the subtle power to subject us to its own reign and influence. On this day we proclaim that Christ is the only King with the power to change and claim our lives.”
David Christopher McGough (1944–2023) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To recognise Christ as King is to surrender our lives to his service (22 November 2020) The Herald
“The other aspect of the conflict is, and here you are absolutely right, that we have people in power who have different goals despite being part of the same team. Some of them have come to power with very clear business interests.”
Yulia Tymoshenko (born 1960) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In my experience, there is much greater currency and power in my deployment of irreverent idioms of satire, mockery, and ridicule of oppressive power.”
Stella Nyanzi (born 1974) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I think it's a good thing to look back on and understand that you have a power really. You have power in it and to use it wisely and to the best of our abilities too. Do good rather than bad.”
Sasha Pieterse (born 1996) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I define myself as a anarchist priest. The term anarchist comes from Greek and means against every power that oppresses. Whoever has a responsibility must be of service and not exercise power, or repression, or despotism. The true anarchist can choose non-violence, the epochal turning point of humanity. (p. 28)”
Andrea Gallo (1928–2013) said by 2013 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It’s a "high-end" power in the traditional sense and linked to the image of the "glass ceiling", which not only places women out of power, but imagines pioneers as successful superwomen who only a few vestiges of male prejudice prevented them from reaching the top.”
Mary Beard (classicist) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Women must know that the strongest power in the world is economic power”
Esther Afua Ocloo (1919–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When you delve deeper into these anxieties, you realize that it is always about power; the fear of losing power when the feminist is allowed equal footing in society.”
Ukamaka Olisakwe (born 1982) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“First, we have to define power: social or formal power is control over other people, their choices, their outcomes, and control of resources and decisions that affect other people,”
Amy Cuddy (born 1972) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In my own burnout and depression after this — because it was soul-crushing — Amit was showing me that there is power in humor, there is power in levity,” Aaker says. “I was seeing that if you don’t have enough humor and levity, you will burn out. That put me on a new research journey around understanding the behavioral science of humor — when and why it works.”
Jennifer Aaker (born 1967) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We activists are not in the business of brokering power where expediency and compromise rule. Our business is to resist and expose the ugly face of power. We are guided and our work is informed by deeply held human values and causes. It seems to me that consistency of principles and commitment to humanity should inform all our work, thought, activism and advocacy.”
Issa G. Shivji (born 1946) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“People may do things that can trigger certain emotion, but the processing, decision-making and power lies within you. You have more power than you may sometimes realise.”
Liam Hackett (born 1991) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Military power is sustained, in the final result, by economic power. If the latter crumbles, so eventually will the former.”
Paul Kennedy (born 1945) first seen 1988 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 'Benighted state of America', The Times (12 March 1988), p. 8
“Power changes its appearance but not its reality. Politics are about power; we cannot evade that truth or its consequences. We dream of a better world but it is in Utopia – that is, nowhere.”
Bertrand de Jouvenel (1903–1987) said by 1987 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“As every advance of Power is useful for war, so war is useful for the advance of power; war is like a sheep-dog harrying the laggard Powers to catch up their smarter fellows in the totalitarian race.”
Bertrand de Jouvenel (1903–1987) said by 1987 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Power is linked with war, and a society wishing to limit war's ravages can find no other way than by limiting the scope of Power.”
Bertrand de Jouvenel (1903–1987) said by 1987 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[T]here are no institutions on earth which enable each separate person to have a hand in the exercise of Power, for Power is command, and everyone cannot command. Sovereignty of the people is, therefore, nothing but a fiction, and one which must in the long run prove destructive of individual liberties.”
Bertrand de Jouvenel (1903–1987) said by 1987 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We are horrified by the fantasy of a subtle use of violence that could change us without our knowing it. This would be the ultimate weapon of offense or defense. But whether this pure power appears in its positive role as The Method for finding truth, or in its negative role as the Sophistic power of persuasion, the same mistake occurs.”
David Kolb (born 1939) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[M]eaningful politics must recognize other important values in human life. Indeed, politics makes no sense when it stands by itself. If the question who wields political power is not broadened to take account of what that power is to be used for - that is, what human values it will serve - then it reduces to a matter of who manages to subdue whom.”
Roger Kimball (born 1953) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The power to create order is one thing. The power to destroy is another. Always they are in balance. But it is easier to destroy than to create, and there are those whose nature it is to love destruction.”
Lev Grossman (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One of the secrets Martin must have learned down below the Northern Marsh was how not to care about some things, and there was power in that, the power to live as though his actions had no consequences. It fell to us to witness the consequences, and they were ugly.”
Lev Grossman (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Read any history of first contact between civilizations. Even if those in power on the weaker side are able to fight back, there are always those who turn traitor and support the invaders. They are the Luministes in the picture, they sell their own people into submission to gain power under the invader.”
Sean McMullen (born 1948) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The power of one is above all things the power to believe in yourself, ofen well beyond any latent ability you may have previously demonstrated. The mind is the athlete, the body is simply the means it uses to run faster or longer, jump higher, shoot straighter, kick better, swim harder, hit further, or box better.”
Bryce Courtenay (1933–2012) said by 2012 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The next time that we get power, whether it's...President Trump round two in 2024...I think the thing that we have to take away from the last ten years is that we really need to be really ruthless when it comes to the exercise of power.”
J.D. Vance (born 1984) first seen 2021 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On the Federalist Radio Hour (May 18, 2021), as cited in "Why J.D. Vance Is Thinking 'Very Seriously' About A Senate Bid". Event occurs from 25:31 to 25:39.
“These men who were to lead us out of our despair,they came like man already grown fat and cynical with the eating of centuries of power they had never struggled for old before they had even been borninto power,and ready only for the grave.”
Ayi Kwei Armah (born 1939) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The only reason that I write is to bring about a change of heart. But I wanted to do that when I was five, when I first endured racial discrimination. I would like to change that person's mind and heart about the way they see me, about the way they feel about me. But I had no power then, and I have power now. It's called a pen. Or in this case a computer, yeah?”
Lee Maracle (1950–2021) said by 2021 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The duty of every Christian is to be revolutionary, and that of the revolutionary to make the revolution (...) when the people decide to fight to the end there will be no power that can be superior to the power of that people who want their freedom.”
Camilo Torres Restrepo (1929–1966) said by 1966 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Islamic politics is not the politics of coming to power, Islamic politics is the politics after coming to power.”
Abubakar Muhammad Zakaria (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The people as a source of sovereign power are in truth only occasional partners in the constitutional minuet danced for most of the time by Parliament and the political party in power.”
Leslie Scarman, Baron Scarman (1911–2004) first seen 1989 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Shape of Things to Come (1989)
“As ministers, your words hold the power to inspire peace and guide the hearts of many. Let us use this power wisely.”
Irene Naa Torshie Addo (born 1970) first seen 2024 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Naa Torshie’s peace and tolerance call ahead of 2024 Ghana election
“I have witnessed a Gambia in decline, with deteriorating institutions where those in authority misuse state power to spread fear and hopelessness among the people. Today, Gambians are not free to express their thoughts; fear and terror, fueled by the abuse of state power, have taken such a hold that most people look over their shoulders before they speak.”
Isatou Touray (born 1955) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Wind power: only 0.6% [of world energy production] and you have a very large untapped potential... Mostly the closer you get to the poles, the more wind power potential, especially offshore.”
Bjarke Ingels (born 1974) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is a remedy against the domination imposed, not by generals, statesmen, and men of action, whose power dissolves when they retire, but by the great sort-crossers, whose power increases when they die- the remedy of becoming aware of metaphor...”
Colin Murray Turbayne (1916–2006) first seen 1962 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: , The Myth of Metaphor (1962) p. 5.
“Now, never underestimate the power of the mind. What African futurism does is harness that power into action. It empowers us to craft the future that we want.”
Sylvia Tamale (born 1962) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This is not to say that fantasy is free of social relations and power, but she argues that its process “orchestrates and shatters relations of power.”
Shulamith Behr (1946–2023) said by 2023 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The reader is there to be schooled and herded about and put in their place. It’s taken me years to realize how absurd and borderline disturbing Achebe’s statement is. It points to the power differential that has always defined the writer-reader relationship in African literary culture. Really, it’s all about power.”
Ainehi Edoro wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Religion is, or should be, primarily about faith and not about political power. But when religion is used as a tool for those in power to influence politics, then religion can become a tool for harm, whether in the short term or long term.”
Azza Karam (born 1968) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Our power is measured not in our ability to have the most mighty armies, our power as humanity is measured in our ability to standing defense of the most vulnerable among us, that includes our planet.”
Azza Karam (born 1968) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Power does not corrupt. Corrupt people seek power.”
Mark Pellegrino (born 1965) first seen 2025 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 8. Power does not corrupt Corrupt people seek power, YouTube (January 18th, 2025)
“The civilisation and social structure of our country, rightly or wrongly, take for granted that a few people shall have a lot of money and a lot of power, and great many people very little money and very little power. But the individuals, and particularly the labouring individuals, who create and compose our civilisation and society, are beginning to cease to take this state of things for granted.”
Gerald Gould (1885–1936) said by 1936 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Speaking truth to power, as the motto goes – whether this power is academic or political – may be a perilous exercise.”
Didier Fassin (born 1955) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I don’t get why these kids think they’re the first. There’s a lacking in historical referencing and reverencing. Their art doesn’t take any risks. It doesn’t love itself. It doesn’t love people. It’s only interested in power; not even power, it’s all vanity. And I don’t think people are looking at books enough.”
Tracey Rose (born 1974) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source