William S. Cohen Quotes
When you have stability, you have at least an opportunity to enjoy prosperity because investment flows. Business tends to follow the flag. When they find a secure environment, they will invest.
William S. Cohen, U.S. Senator (Republican, ME), U. S. Secretary of Defense, Speech, Munich, Germany, 1998
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
Responding to an editorial criticizing Malawi's government as a tyranny:
The United States was desirous of providing assistance to the Benito Juarez Republican government of Mexico. Both governments were desirous of American foreign investment in Mexico. However, the Juarez government was not in real control of Mexico. State and local government, many corrupt, seized foreign owned business property, reneged on agreements. Others tried to regulate some of the abusive labor employment practices that some American firms had practiced. But little of this, both reasonable and not, was with the consent and even knowledge of the Mexican national government. Capen’s basic observation, so relevant to economic development in modern times was prescient and fundamental to the development of the third world and even the former Soviet Union. If there is insufficient government protection for business, then the high risk will drive out investors who would take reasonable returns. The only investors would then require very high returns, which themselves would inhibit the very growth and development that we want to stimulate.
During the revolution against apartheid, a number of communist organizations allied themselves with the ANC against the White minority regime. A few of the communist leaders rose and became officials of the ANC. The vast majority of the ANC supported private enterprise with the kind of socialist aspects that were then typical of the Scandinavian countries, Germany and even France. Mandela, before the successful ousting of the Apartheid held a number of communist ideas and principles as the “capitalists” were making money from the apartheid system and there would support the status quo, However, he had a change of heart and mind regarding private enterprise after the successful effort to end white minority rule. He was good to his word, and even after he retired, the ANC and the government maintained pro private enterprise policies.
His government had just used force to disarm the rebellion of religious Kurds.
William Sebastian Cohen is an American politician, lawyer and author from the U.S. state of Maine. A Republican, Cohen served as both a member of the United States House of Representatives (1973–1979) and Senate (1979–1997), and as Secretary of Defense (1997–2001) under Democratic President Bill Clinton.
