Karl Radek Quotes

At the time I was arrested I had no idea it would turn into this. It was just a day like any other day. The only thing that made it significant was that the masses of the people joined in.

The press should be not only a collective propagandist and a collective agitator, but also a collective organizer of the masses.

The Congress decisively rejects terrorism, i.e., the system of individual political assassinations, as being a method of political struggle which is most inexpedient at the present time, diverting the best forces from the urgent and imperatively necessary work of organization and agitation, destroying contact between the revolutionaries and the masses of the revolutionary classes of the population, and spreading both among the revolutionaries themselves and the population in general utterly distorted ideas of the aims and methods of struggle against the autocracy.

In the late 1960s, the masses were supposed to be passive, not entering into the public arena and having their voices heard.

In the unrest of the masses I augur great good. It is by their realizing that their condition of life is not what it ought to be that vast improvements may be accomplished.

I remember that, although I was full of fervour, I didn't have the slightest inkling, even at forty, of the deeper side to the movement we were pursuing by instinct. It was in the air!

I can't exactly say why there's not much protest music to speak off. And I know there are acts out there still putting a message in their music.

Unless we are prepared to use frequent force, we must put up with things being done…that the majority of people in this country do not approve.

In our eyes, individual terror is inadmissible precisely because it belittles the role of the masses in their own consciousness, reconciles them to their own powerlessness, and turns their eyes and hopes toward a great avenger and liberator who someday will come and accomplish his mission.

Agitators are a set of interfering meddling people, who come down to some perfectly contented class of the community and sow the seeds of discontent amongst them. That is the reason why agitators are so absolutely necessary.

We must not regard what is obsolete to us as something that is obsolete to the class, to the masses...How can one say that ‘parliamentarianism is politically obsolete’, when ‘millions’ and ‘legions’ of proletarians are not only in favor of parliamentarianism in general, but are downright ‘counter revolutionary’!?

To pass a big idea in this town. You almost need social unrest

My duty is to raise the consciousness of the American people.

About things on which the public thinks long it commonly attains to think right.

It is necessary to turn political crisis into armed crisis by performing violent actions that will force those in power to transform the military situation into a political situation. That will alienate the masses, who, from then on, will revolt against the army and the police and blame them for this state of things.

Revolution is the duty of the worker and the peasant masses and not of just a few heroes, hence the necessity to organize these masses and draw them into the struggle.

The essential mark of the agitator is the high value he places on the emotional response of the public. Whether he attacks or defends social institutions is a secondary matter.

If the weapon of the general strike is to be utilized, then the organization must be so built up that this weapon will stand ready for instant use. For the certainty of success in a general strike lies in its suddenness. Ever more numerous and greater will become the great strikes and outbreaks of this character which shake the social life of the nation to its foundation …

If murder and arson and pestilence are unleashed throughout civilized Europe--we can only think of this with horror, outrage and indignation churning in our breasts. And we ask ourselves: are we men, are the proletarians of today still sheep that they can be led dumbly to slaughter?....

Public policies in our democracy are eventually a reflection of public opinion," so public opinion must be reshaped if we are to avoid disaster.

You cannot do anything without rousing the masses to action.

I urge you to read the Occupy Manifesto, written by the New York City General Assembly. It is unavoidably clear. This is not directionless action. If it were, the media would have moved on.

The masses go into a revolution not with a prepared plan of social reconstruction, but with a sharp feeling that they cannot endure the old regime. Only the guiding layers of a class have a political program, and even this still requires the test of events and the approval of the masses.

Publicity, discussion, and agitation are necessary to accomplish any work of lasting benefit.

I'm not trying to amass people in the streets. I just want them to be more aware.