Quotessence
Home / Topics / Rules For Radicals Quotes

Rules For Radicals Quotes

Browse 87 quotes about Rules For Radicals.

Related topics

MeanWorldPeopleIfsEnemyOrganizerTacticsActionEndsFirsts

Rules For Radicals Quotes

“An organizer working in and for an open society is in an ideological dilemma to begin with, he does not have a fixed truth - truth to him is relative and changing; everything to him is relative and changing.... To the extent that he is free from the shackles of dogma, he can respond to the realities of the widely different situations.”

DoeDifferentRealitySituationFixedRelativeDogmaDilemmaIdeologicalShacklesOrganizerRules For RadicalsChanging Everything
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“A Marxist begins with his prime truth that all evils are caused by the exploitation of the proletariat by the capitalists. From this he logically proceeds to the revolution to end capitalism, then into the third stage of reorganization into a new social order of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and finally the last stage -- the political paradise of communism.”

EndsLastsPoliticalOrderEvilSocialStageRevolutionCapitalismThirdsCommunismParadisePrimeCapitalistDictatorshipExploitationMarxistProletariatSocial OrderRules For RadicalsReorganization
Book:Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals
Create image

“The end is what you want, the means is how you get it. Whenever we think about social change, the question of means and ends arises. The man of action views the issue of means and ends in pragmatic and strategic terms. He has no other problem; he thinks only of his actual resources and the possibilities of various choices of action. He asks of ends only whether they are achievable and worth the cost; of means, only whether they will work. ... The real arena is corrupt and bloody.”

ThinkingMenWantMeanRealEndsProblemActionChoicesAsksSocialTermViewsIssuesPossibilityHe ManCostResourcesVariousWhat You WantAriseBloodyArenaSocial ChangeStrategicPragmaticRules For Radicals
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“From the moment the organizer enters a community he lives, dreams... only one thing and that is to build the mass power base of what he calls the army. Until he has developed that mass power base, he confronts no major issues.... Until he has those means and power instruments, his tactics are very different from power tactics. Therefore, every move revolves around one central point: how many recruits will this bring into the organization, whether by means of local organizations, churches, service groups, labor Unions, corner gangs, or as individuals.”

MeanDifferentMomentsDreamMovingIndividualCommunityChurchIssuesOne ThingGroupsMajorsMassLaborOrganizationArmyInstrumentsUnionsCornersLocalsTacticsGangRecruitOrganizerLabor UnionRules For RadicalsLife DreamLiving The DreamChurch Service
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“The first step in community organization is community disorganization. The disruption of the present organization is the first step toward community organization. Present arrangements must be disorganized if they are to be displace by new patterns.... All change means disorganization of the old and organization of the new.”

IfsFirstsMeanCommunityStepsOrganizationPatternsFirst StepsArrangementsDisruptionRules For RadicalsDisorganizedDisorganization
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“The organizers first job is to create the issues or problems, and organizations must be based on many issues. The organizer must first rub raw the resentments of the people of the community; fan the latent hostilities of many of the people to the point of overt expression. He must search out controversy and issues, rather than avoid them, for unless there is controversy people are not concerned enough to act. . . . An organizer must stir up dissatisfaction and discontent.”

PeopleFirstsEnoughProblemJobsCommunityIssuesFansExpressionConcernedOrganizationResentmentControversyHostilityDiscontentDissatisfactionLatentOrganizerRules For Radicals
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“Theres another reason for working inside the system. Dostoevsky said that taking a new step is what people fear most. Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the mass of our people. They must feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so futureless in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and change the future. This acceptance is the reformation essential to any revolution.”

PeopleFeelsSaidReasonPastLostChallengesAttitudeStepsAcceptanceWillingRevolutionLetting GoEssentialsMassRevolutionaryPassiveFrustratedDefeatedReformationPrevailingAffirmativeRules For RadicalsRevolutionary Change
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“Radicals must be resilient, adaptable to shifting political circumstances, and sensitive enough to the process of action and reaction to avoid being trapped by their own tactics and forced to travel a road not of their choosing.”

EnoughActionPoliticalProcessCircumstancesReactionsRadicalSensitiveTrappedTacticsShiftingResilientRules For RadicalsAdaptableAction And Reaction
Book:Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals
Create image

“Organization for action will now and in the decade ahead center upon America's white middle class. That is where the power is. ... Our rebels have contemptuously rejected the values and the way of life of the middle class. They have stigmatized it as materialistic, decadent, bourgeois, degenerate, imperialistic, war-mongering, brutalized and corrupt. They are right; but we must begin from where we are if we are to build power for change, and the power and the people are in the middle class majority.”

PeopleIfsWayWarActionAmericaValuesWhiteClassMiddleOrganizationMajorityDecadesMiddle ClassRebelRejectedBourgeoisMaterialisticDegeneratesRules For Radicals
Author:Saul Alinsky
Create image

“The practical revolutionary will understand Goethe's 'conscience is the virtue of observers and not of agents of action'; in action, one does not always enjoy the luxury of a decision that is consistent both with one's individual conscience and the good of mankind.”

DoeActionIndividualEnjoyDecisionVirtueMankindConsciencePracticalsAgentsLuxuryRevolutionaryConsistentObserversRules For Radicals
Book:Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals
Create image