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Quote by Thomas Pogge

“Our Supreme Court has lifted the practice of buying legislation to the level of a constitutional principle by repeatedly protecting corporate spending for and against political candidates, as well as promises and threats of such spending to bribe and blackmail such candidates, by appeal to the free-speech clause of the First Amendment.”

Quote by Thomas Pogge

Author

Thomas Pogge is a German-born American philosopher known for his contributions to ethics and political philosophy. His research focuses on issues of global justice, poverty, and inequality, particularly concerning human rights in developing countries. more

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“I think that many citizens understand how our system works, or rather, fails to work, for structural reasons. But who has the capacity and the incentives to bring change? The banks and other corporations love the system because it allows them to buy legislation that serves their own interests even at the expense of the vast majority of citizens. Incumbent politicians love the system because it allows them to raise millions of dollars toward defending their seats.”

Thinking Reason Interest Millions Failing Citizens Politician Capacity Raises Majority Dollars Corporations Seats Expenses Legislation Incentives Incumbents

Author:Thomas Pogge

“The extremely low respect Congress enjoys among the population indicates that the citizens understand broadly what's going on. But the lack of a realistic political reform path leads to apathy and the kind of mindless frustration that manifests itself in the Tea Party-style hatred of any and all government.”

Kind Government Political Enjoy Party Path Style Citizens Lows Hatred Congress Population Reform Tea Frustration Realistic Apathy Tea Party Mindless Political Reform

Author:Thomas Pogge

“Large multinational corporations, often acting through their industry lobbies, exert a powerful influence on the formulation of domestic rules and on their application - but their influence on supranational institutional design is even larger because it faces practically no opposition there.”

Faces Powerful Acting Influence Design Industry Corporations Opposition Application Multinationals Multinational Corporations

Author:Thomas Pogge

“There is at the global level a very small number of actors who can meaningfully weigh in on global institutional design, who are able - through powerful governments and most effectively through the government of the United States - to exert substantial influence on international negotiations, which are routinely conducted behind closed doors.”

“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.”

Giving Made Opportunity Voice Decision Citizens Ordinary Organization Opposition Organize Legislation Civil Society Ordinary Citizens

Author:Thomas Pogge

“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.”

Way Important Form Decision Influence Design Citizens Politician Ordinary Organization International Agreement Adopted Civil Society Timely Lobbying Ordinary Citizens

Author:Thomas Pogge

“One is actually the democracy here, you know, people are, people assume that this election means that there is democracy in Pakistan. There is no democracy.”

People Knows Mean Sports Democracy Election Assuming Pakistan

Author:Imran Khan

“Domestic and supranational regulatory capture leads to two things: on the one hand, to an inequality spiral where the rich get richer because they can influence rulemaking and rule application in their favor; on the other hand, it also leads to instability. This is so because the relatively few organizations capable of influencing supranational rulemaking through the lobbying of major governments have diverse interests. This will, in some cases, lead to compromises. But it will also lead to spheres of influence.”

“Each powerful player, or coalition of players, will make concessions in areas where it has relatively less at stake in exchange for other such players making reciprocal concessions in other areas where it has relatively more at stake. Such trades are collectively rational insofar as they get each of the powerful players more of what it wants. But such trades are also dangerous because the whole international rule-system will become incoherent and therefore vulnerable to crises that will continue to become increasingly severe.”

Want Whole Powerful Player Dangerous Areas Crisis Trade International Rational Vulnerable Stakes Severe Coalitions Concessions Reciprocal

Author:Thomas Pogge

“The World Bank is the monopoly provider of poverty data and, partly due to a leadership change there, the World Bank's reporting has been heavily on the rosy side since about 2000. The Bank's cultivation of an upbeat picture affords a very interesting lesson in statistics and how you can, depending on which numbers you present and how you present them, create a more positive or more negative impression of the evolution of poverty.”

World Has Beens Sides Interesting Numbers Poverty Evolution Lessons Negative Dues Impression Data Statistics Monopoly Very Interesting Cultivation Providers Rosy Upbeat World Bank

Author:Thomas Pogge