The best defence [for a democracy, for the public good] is aggressiveness, the aggressiveness of the involved citizen. We need to reassert that slow, time-consuming, inefficient, boring process that requires our involvement; it is called 'being a citizen.' The public good is not something that you can see. It is not static. It is a process. It is the process by which democratic civilizations build themselves.
John Ralston SaulSimplicity is no longer presented as a virtue. The value of complex and difficult language has been preached with such insistence that the public has begun to believe the lack of clarity must be a sign of artistic talent.
John Ralston SaulElites quite naturally define as the most important and admired qualities for a citizen those on which they themselves have concentrated.
John Ralston SaulIf the technocratic class often invokes technology, it is because these inanimate objects can take on a trajectory of their own and so cover for the manager's inability to give leadership.
John Ralston SaulI have a theory of statistics: if you can double them or halve them and they still work, they are really good statistics.
John Ralston SaulPeople cannot do what they cannot think, and they cannot think what they cannot say.
John Ralston SaulIn general, democracy and individualism have advanced in spite of and often against specific economic interest. Both democracy and individualism have been based upon financial sacrifice, not gain. Even in Athens, a large part of the 7,000 citizens who participated regularly in assemblies were farmers who had to give up several days' work to go into town to talk and listen.
John Ralston Saul