Quotes About Social Movements

#1. The only continent where social movements have led to political parties that have pushed through serious social and political reforms is in South America.

Tariq Ali

#2. Understanding Hamas/Hezbollah as social movements that are progressive, that are on the left, that are part of a global left, is extremely important. That does not stop us from being critical of certain dimensions of both movements.

Judith Butler

#3. We hope that general readers with an interest in Japan will find in these accounts of fieldwork a wide spectrum of illustrations of the grassroots realities of everyday life in contemporary Japanese communities, companies, institutions, and social movements.

Theodore C. Bestor

#4. Angela Davis offers a cartography of engagement in oppositional social movements and unwavering commitment to justice.

Chandra Talpade Mohanty

#5. There are no globalized, youth-led, grassroots social movements advocating for democratic culture across Muslim-majority societies. There is no equivalent of Al-Qaeda without the terrorism.

Maajid Nawaz

#6. Major social movements eventually fade into the landscape not because they have diminished but because they have become a permanent part of our perceptions and experience.

Freda Adler

#7. I have no regrets about my political activity, only that I sometimes got carried away with it and didn't find the right balance between obligations to my family and my need to be involved in social movements.

Howard Zinn

#8. Very important thing to keep in mind, that when justice comes and when injustices are remedied, they're not remedied by the initiative of the national government or the politicians. They only respond to the power of social movements.

Howard Zinn

#9. Never depend upon institutions or government to solve any problem. All social movements are founded by, guided by, motivated and seen through by the passion of individuals.

Margaret Mead

#10. Generally speaking, beliefs arise from an event or character that may or may not be authentic, and rapidly evolve into social movements that are conditioned and shaped by the political, economic and societal circumstances of the group that accepts them.

Carlos Ruiz Zafon

#11. We may repeat the awful revolutionary history of the 20th century because of the vulnerability of social movements to demagoguery.

Todd Gitlin

#12. Cults, or related social movements such as the Taliban in Afghanistan, result in massive military expenses.

Keith Henson

#13. One of the problems we're facing is, in my view, that there are no globalized, youth-led, grassroots social movements advocating for democratic culture across Muslim-majority societies.

Maajid Nawaz

#14. Individuals bearing witness cannot do the work of social movements, but they can break a corrosive and demoralizing silence.

Ellen Willis

#15. To all of the young people out there who are creating social change or even fomenting social movements: hold on to your idealism and your belief in your ability to change the world. Your lofty goals demand attention and deserve support.

Lynn Schusterman

#16. History is the product of vast, amorphous and indecipherable social movements.

Leo Tolstoy

#17. I am, in general, favourable to activism and social movements and hostile to graft and corruption.

Tariq Ali

#18. The role that theater has placed in enhancing consciousness and moving systems ahead. I think of what South African theater meant for the apartheid movement, for example. I think of what music has meant for so many social movements across time.

Saul Williams

#19. Conflict manipulation is the favored strategy of people who incessantly worry about failure, of managers who excel at motivational chats that point out the highly unpleasant consequences if the company's goals are not achieved, and of social movements that attempt to mobilize people through fear.

Peter M. Senge

#20. Storytelling may be what most distinguishes social movements from interest groups.

Marshall Ganz

#21. Music has always pushed ahead social movements and can do much more than just dumb down a populace.

Saul Williams

#22. Religious communities have historically been designed to counteract the forces of alienation. That's why so many successful social movements have relied upon the strength of spiritual communities and a large base of their organizing has been through them.

Tim DeChristopher

#23. A new breed of Americans born out of the social movements of the 60s and grown into a majority in the 70s holds a set of values so markedly different from the traditional outlook that they promise to transform the character of work in America in the 80s.

Daniel Yankelovich

#24. As I review the great history of our nation, community organizers have been at the center of so many of our great social movements.

Cory Booker

#25. If you can reach just 10 percent of the population, you can begin to reach a tipping point; that's where true social movements take place - it's a numbers game. And when you reach that number, the truth becomes obvious and empires of injustice crumble and fall.

Louie Psihoyos

#26. The great thing about social movements is everybody gets to be a part of them.

Jim Wallis

#27. Universities are some of the few places left where a struggle for the commons, for public life, if not democracy itself, can be made visible through the medium of collective voices and social movements energized by the need for a politics and way of life counter to authoritarian capitalism.

Henry Giroux

#28. Social movements are at once the symptoms and the instruments of progress. Ignore them and statesmanship is irrelevant; fail to use them and it is weak.

Walter Lippmann

#29. All the major social movements of the 20th century had great soundtracks - We need that. The left needs better propaganda, because we don't have the Koch brothers. It takes a different kind of capital to fight that stuff.

DJ Spooky

#30. All the movements of our body are not merely those dictated by impulse or weariness; they are the correct expression of what we consider decorous. Without impulses, we could take no part in social life; on the other hand, without inhibitions, we could not correct, direct, and utilize our impulses.

Maria Montessori

#31. Concerned consumers are realizing that they can use social media to organize themselves around shared values to start effective movements. Social media gives them a sounding board to share ideas, as well as a means to punish irresponsible corporate behaviors.

Simon Mainwaring

#32. So many idealistic political movements for a better world have ended in mass-murdering dictatorships. Giving leaders enough power to create 'social justice' is giving them enough power to destroy all justice, all freedom, and all human dignity.

Thomas Sowell

#33. I've been involved in social activism my entire life, and I would argue that many people involved in social activist movements have done very little work on themselves.

Eve Ensler

#34. Radical thought has inspired many of the great political and social reform movements in American history, from ending slavery to establishing the minimum wage.

Carl Bernstein

#35. The two great movements of our century
towards Liberty of the individual and social co-operation of the whole community
are summed up in Anarchist-Communism.

Peter Kropotkin

#36. Indeed, all the great movements for social justice in our society have strongly emphasized a love ethic.

Bell Hooks

#37. I would be the last to condemn the thousands of sincere and dedicated people outside the churches who have labored unselfishly through various humanitarian movements to cure the world of social evils, for I would rather a man be a committed humanist than an uncommitted Christian.

Martin Luther King Jr.

#38. New theories and new movements do not develop in a vacuum, they arise to spearhead the necessary social solutions to new problems resulting from contradictions in the environment.

Shulamith Firestone

#39. Today women in many countries are taking part in various types of movements of protest, some of which are serious struggles for economic and social emancipation .

Kumari Jayawardena

#40. The only social justice movements worth fighting for are the struggles for justice where you lose, you lose, you lose- until you win.

I. F. Stone

#41. By thinking globally I can analyze all phenomena, but when it comes to acting, it can only be local and on a grassroots level if it is to be honest, realistic, and authentic.

Jacques Ellul

#42. Campuses not only help create social justice movements, they need them.

Gloria Steinem

#43. Our situation is intolerable, but what's worse
is to sit here and do nothing.

Rita Dove

#44. Social media spark a revelation that we, the people, have a voice, and through the democratization of content and ideas we can once again unite around common passions, inspire movements, and ignite change.

Brian Solis

#45. Political and social history are in my view two aspects of the same process. Social life loses half its interest and political movements lose most of their meaning if they are considered separately.

F. M. Powicke

#46. Never was a Family more insistent on learning one another's movements than were the Bunch. All of them volubly knew, or indignantly desired to know, where all the others had been every minute of the week.

Sinclair Lewis

#47. I think people think their incomes have been flat lining for a long period of time. They feel that the next generation's opportunities are not going to be improvement. So and I also think that social media then allows insurgent movements to gain scale at speed.

Tony Blair

#48. A social movement that only moves people is merely a revolt. A movement that changes both people and institutions is a revolution.

Martin Luther King Jr.

#49. They're [social media] amazing tools to communicate information - especially about different causes or crises or movements.

Scarlett Johansson

#50. Resistence can start and happen everywhere and whenever you want.

Roem Topatimasang

#51. It may well be that we will have to repent in this generation. Not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, Wait on time.

Martin Luther King Jr.

#52. Until women are deeply involved in opposing the violence in the world, we are not going to bring it to an end. All women must be equally at the forefront of the movements for social justice. And

Desmond Tutu

#53. The relationship between the government of the United States and social and indigenous movements has always been difficult. Not just in Bolivia but worldwide. We need to have bilateral relations characterized by mutual respect.

Evo Morales