Quotessence
Home / Books / Autocracy, Inc.

Autocracy, Inc.

Book by Anne Applebaum · 7 quotes · Autocracy, Autocracies, Democracy

Filter quotes by topic

AllAutocracyAutocraciesDemocracyAutocratsDemocraciesDictatorshipDictatorshipsFreedomLiarsLiesLyingPoliticsPowerCynicismFalsehoodsFearInternational RelationsIsolationismPropagandaRule Of Law

Autocracy, Inc. Quotes

“On February 24, 2022, Russia launched a full-scale war against Ukraine, the first full-scale kinetic battle in the struggle between Autocracy, Inc., and what might loosely be described as the democratic world. Russia plays a special role in the autocratic network, both as the inventor of the modern marriage of kleptocracy and dictatorship and as the country now most aggressively seeking to upend the status quo. The invasion was planned in that spirit. Putin hoped not only to acquire territory, but also to show the world that the old rules of international behavior no longer hold.”

WarDemocracyRussiaDictatorshipUkraineInternational RelationsAutocracyKleptocracy
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image

“There is no liberal world order anymore, and the aspiration to create one no longer seems real. But there are liberal societies, open and free countries that offer a better chance for people to live useful lives than closed dictatorships do. They are hardly perfect. Those that exist have deep flaws, profound divisions, and terrible historical scars. But that’s all the more reason to defend and protect them. So few of them have existed across human history; so many have existed for a short time and then failed. They can be destroyed from the outside and from the inside, too, by division and demagogues. Or they can be saved. But only if those of us who live in them are willing to make the effort to save them.”

FreedomDemocracySocietyLiberalismDictatorshipDictatorshipsDemocracies
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image

“If people are naturally drawn to the image of human rights, to the language of democracy, to the dream of freedom, then those ideas have to be poisoned. That requires not just surveillance, and not merely a political system that defends against liberal ideas. It also requires an offensive plan, a narrative that damages the idea of democracy, wherever it is being used, anywhere in the world.”

PoliticsFreedomDemocracyHuman RightsSurveillancePolitical SystemsAutocracyAutocrats
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image

“...I believe the citizens of the United States, and the citizens of the democracies of Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America, should begin thinking of themselves as linked to one another and to the people who share their values inside autocracies too. They need one another, now more than ever, because their democracies are not safe. Nobody's democracy is safe. Americans, with our long history of imagining ourselves to be exceptional, would do well to remember that our domestic politics have always been connected to, and influenced by, a larger struggle for freedom and the rule of law around the world.”

FreedomDemocracyRule Of LawInterdependenceAutocracyExceptionalismAmerican ExceptionalismAutocraciesDemocracies
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image

“In recent years various dictatorships--of both internal and external origin--have collapsed or stumbled when confronted by defiant, mobilized people." Those are the opening words of From Dictatorship to Democracy, an iconic pamphlet composed by Gene Sharp, an American academic. Sharp emerged from the world of pacifism, civil rights, and antiwar activism in the 1950s to become, by the 1990s, an advocate of nonviolent revolution. A student of Gandhi, King, and Thoreau, Sharp believed that dictatorships survive not because of the unusual powers or personalities of dictators but because most people who live under their rule are apathetic or afraid. He believed that if they overcame their apathy and fear, and that if they refused to acquiesce to the dictator's demands, then the dictator would no longer be able to rule.”

DemocracyRevolutionNonviolenceDictatorshipAutocracyDictatorshipsAutocraciesGene Sharp
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image

“Democracies should work, again in coalitions, to promote transparency, to create international standards, to ensure that autocracies don't set the rules and shape the products. We are becoming aware of all these things very late. Around the world, democratic activists, from Moscow to Hong Kong to Caracas, have been warning us that our industries, our economic policies, and our research efforts are enabling the economic and even the military aggression of others, and they are right.”

DemocracyStandardsResearchEconomicsCoalitionsAutocracyActivistsIndustriesAutocraciesDemocracies
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image

“No democratic government should ever assume that arguments for democracy or for the rule of law are somehow obvious or self-evident. Authoritarian narratives are designed to undermine the innate appeal of those ideas, to characterize dictatorship as stable and democracy as chaotic. Democratic media, civic organizations, and politicians need to argue back and make the case for transparency, accountability, and liberty--at home and around the world.”

DemocracyChaosAccountabilityStabilityTransparencyRule Of LawAuthoritarianismGovernmentsDictatorshipsDemocratic Governments
Book:Autocracy, Inc.
Create image