Thomas Piketty Quotes

The case for democracy is not esthetic.

The worst that can happen under monarchy is rule by a single imbecile, but democracy often means the rule by an assembly of three or four hundred imbeciles.

A nation can be one or the other, a democracy or an imperialist, but it can't be both. If it sticks to imperialism, it will, like the old Roman Republic, on which so much of our system was modeled, like the old Roman Republic, it will lose its democracy to a domestic dictatorship.

Democracy is an awful way to run a country, but it's the best system we have.

To make Democracy work, you need an aristocratic democracy. To make Aristocracy work, you need a democratic aristocracy.

All forms of the state have democracy for their truth, and for that reason are false to the extent that they are not democracy

From literature to ecology, from the escape velocity of galaxies to the greenhouse effect, from garbage disposal methods to traffic jams, everything is discussed in our world. But the democratic system, as if it were a given fact, untouchable by nature until the end of time, we don't discuss that.

... the grand depository of the democratic principles of the Government ...

Democracy is not a form of government. It is a political philosophy that can be embodied in various systems of government.

A little citizenship ought to be taught at the mother’s knee and in the nursery. Citizenship is what makes a republic; monarchies can get along without it.

There's not a system better than another. There are some people better than others. I'm not anti-democracy, but there's no real system yet that has proven itself to be the right one.

The true policy of government is to make use of aristocracy, but under the forms and in the spirit of democracy.

Democracy, in its best state, is but the politics of Bedlam; while kept chained, its thoughts are frantic, but when it breaks loose, it kills the keeper, fires the building, and perishes.

I think that rather than talking about particular models, of which there could be a huge number, we should talk about basic principles of democracy. After all, even within the West, there is no single standard and single model.

You can't always say what's popular and you ought to go with it. I think that's why the founders were concerned about direct democracy. That's why we have a republic and that's why we have representatives who who are supposed to look at the issues and to look out for the next generation as well.

As an American I am of course fundamentally opposed to democracy and to anyone advocating or defending democracy, which in theory and practice is the basis of socialism.

We have, on the whole, more liberty and less equality than Russia has. Russia has less liberty and more equality. Whether democracy should be defined primarily in terms of liberty or equality is a source of unending debate.

Democracy is a request from a War Board, in the middle of a morning in the middle of a war, wanting to know what democracy is.

Democracy is a very bad form of government ... but all the others are so much worse.

We are inclined to confuse freedom and democracy, which we regard as moral principles, with the way in which they are practiced in America with capitalism, federalism, and the two-party system, which are not moral principles but simply the preferred and accepted practices of the American people.

We certainly would not want to have the same kind of democracy as they have in Iraq, I can tell you quite honestly.

It's hard in all countries. Democracy is hard, but it's better than the alternatives.

Democracy, republics: What do these words signify?

The greatest characters the world has known, have rose on the democratic floor. Aristocracy has not been able to keep a proportionate pace with democracy.

Democracy is a kingless regime infested by many kings who are sometimes more exclusive, tyrannical and destructive than one, even if he be a tyrant.