It is important to reclaim for humanity the ground that has been taken from it by various arbitrarily narrow formulations of the demands of rationality
Amartya SenThe success of a society is to be evaluated primarily by the freedoms that members of the society enjoy.
Amartya SenI'm very skeptical of the amount of money that goes into military expenditure, not just in the poor countries [but] also in the rich. I think it's one of the most massive wastes in the world, but education is [at the] other end. It's the bearer of the greatest fruits that mankind has ever known.
Amartya SenCapability is just a concept of what is it we're looking at. Now how far we can go along that and what new capabilities become possible is something we have to judge.
Amartya SenEven in areas like the most depressed region of India in terms of female education, namely Rajasthan, which has [one of] the lowest female literacy [rates] in India. Even there, 80 to 90 percent of the parents would like their girls to go to school. And indeed, about 80 percent would like them to be made compulsory.
Amartya Sen