Villages are small and personal, and their inhabitants have names, characters, and personalities. What more appropriate concept on which to base our institutions of the future than the ancient social unit whose flexibility and strength substained human society through millenia?

There is as far as I know, no example in history, of any state voluntarily ceding power from the centre to its constituent parts.

Some of my unhappiest moments have been in organizations. Somehow it seems to be quite respectable to do things in organizations that you would never do in private life. I have had people insult me to my face in front of colleagues. I have had my feelings rammed down my throat on the pretext that it would do me good. I have been required to do things which I didn't agree with because the organization wished it... In my worst moments I have thought organizations were places designed to be run by sadists and staffed by masochists.

I believe that a lot of our striving after the symbols and levers of success is due to a basic insecurity, a need to prove ourselves. That done, grown up at last, we are free to stop pretending.

We cannot wait for great visions from great people, for they are in short supply. It is up to us to light our own small fires in the darkness.

We learn by reflecting on what has happened. The process seldom works in reverse, although most educational processes assume that it does. We hope that we can teach people how to live before they live, or how to manage before they manage.

Forget land, buildings, or machines-the real source of wealth today is intelligence, applied intelligence. We talk glibly of "intellectual property" without taking on board what it really means. It isn't just patent rights and brand names; it is the brains of the place.