Saul Alinsky
Saul Alinsky
Saul David Alinskywas an American community organizer and writer. He is generally considered to be the founder of modern community organizing. He is often noted for his 1971 book Rules for Radicals...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionActivist
Date of Birth30 January 1909
CountryUnited States of America
mean past self
A revolution without a prior reformation would collapse or become a totalitarian tyranny. A reformation means that masses of our people have reached the point of disillusionment with past ways and values. They don't know what will work but they do know that the prevailing system is self-defeating, frustrating, and hopeless. They won't act for change but won't strongly oppose those who do. The time is then ripe for revolution
past people labels
The American people were, in the beginning, Revolutionaries and Tories. The American people ever since have been Revolutionaries and Tories. They have been Revolutionaries and Tories regardless of the labels of the past and present. Regardless of whether they were Federalists, Democrat-Republicans, Whigs, Know-Nothings, Free Soilers, Unionists or Confederates, Populists, Republicans, Democrats, Socialists, Communists, or Progressives. They have been and are profiteers and patriots. They have been and are conservatives, liberals, and radicals.
eye past hair
The people of America are red, white, black, yellow, and all the shades in between. Their eyes are blue, black, and brown, and all the shades in between. Their hair is straight, curly, kinky, and most of it in between. They are tall and short, slim and fat, athletic and anaemic, and most of them in between. They are the different peoples of the world becoming more and more the "in between." They are a people creating a new bridge of mankind in between the past of narrow nationalistic chauvinism and the horizon of a new mankind--a people of the world. Their face is the face of the future.
airport highly jet kennedy quotes runway society
Quotes from Mao, Castro, and Che Guevara - are as germane to our highly technological, computerized society as a stagecoach on a jet runway at Kennedy airport
jobs issues firsts
In the beginning the organizer's first job is to create the issues or problems.
facts fountainhead rules-for-radicals
It is a sad fact of life that power and fear are the fountainheads of faith.
american-activist power
Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have.
acceptance accepting sudden-death
Once you accept your own death, all of a sudden you are free to live.
long democracy would-be
Organized business has assumed that greater profits would be pretty much of a cure-all, and it has to a major extent ignored the fact that the welfare of business rests upon the welfare of the consumers of a nation; that business or free enterprise will function in a democracy only so long as the democracy functions.
possession ideology prerequisites
The prerequisite for an ideology is possession of a basic truth.
tragedy faces looks
Human beings do not like to look squarely into the face of tragedy. Gloom is unpopular.
moral problem
Those who are most moral are farthest from the problem.
fear mean love-is
Love and faith are not common companions. More commonly power and fear consort with faith....Power is not to be crossed; one must respect and obey. Power means strength, whereas love is a human frailty the people mistrust. It is a sad fact of life that power and fear are the fountainheads of faith.
asking problem diarrhea
Asking a sociologist to solve a problem is like prescribing an enema for diarrhea.