Not wishing to be disturbed over moral issues of the political economy, Americans cling to the notion that the government is a sort of automatic machine, regulated by the balancing of competing interests.

To accept opinions is to gain the good solid feeling of being correct without having to think.

Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both.

What we experience in various and specific milieux, I have noted, is often caused by structural changes. Accordingly, to understand the changes of many personal milieux we are required to look beyond them. And the number and variety of such structural changes increase as the institutions within which we live become more embracing and more intricately connected with one another. To be aware of the idea of social structure and to use it with sensibility is to be capable of tracing such linkages among a great variety of milieux. To be able to do that is to possess the sociological imagination

I try to be objective. I do not claim to be detached.

History is the shank of the social sciences.

Every revolution has its counterrevolution - that is a sign the revolution is for real.