Quotes About Leadership

The spirit of policy and that of bureaucracy are diametrically opposed

The leaders of continental Europe would indeed plough relentlessly ahead with monetary union, so that by the beginning of 1999 the euro Ã¢â'¬â€œ a single European currency managed by an authentically federal European Central Bank Ã¢â'¬â€œ was a reality. In doing so, they revealed their indestructible faith in the power of hierarchical structures even in an age of exponential network growth.

the dichotomy between network and hierarchy is an ancient idea.

You ask professors to study things, but you never put them in charge of anything.

The statesman is therefore like one of the heroes in classical drama who has had a vision of the future but who cannot transmit it directly to his fellow-men and who cannot validate its truth. Nations learn only by experience; they 'know' only when it is too late to act. But statesmen must act as if their intuition were already experience, as if their aspiration were truth.

Niall Ferguson

propinquity to power is perceived to matter, especially in a time of crisis.

striving to be a master of the universe

John [Ivan] the Terrible

Niall Ferguson

Niall Ferguson

Niall Ferguson

Niall Ferguson

Niall Ferguson

Edmund Burke habló en nombre de muchos cuando dijo: «El uso de la fuerza exclusivamente […] puede dominar por un momento, pero no evita la necesidad de volver a dominar otra vez, y una nación no es gobernada si ha de ser perpetuamente conquistada».

He who becomes a Prince through the favour of the people should always keep on good terms with them; which it is easy for him to do, since all they ask is not to be oppressed

In conclusion, the arms of others either fall from your back, or they weigh you down, or they bind you fast.

He who builds on the people, builds on the mud

A prince must not have any other object nor any other thought… but war, its institutions, and its discipline; because that is the only art befitting one who commands.

Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them. And I shall dare to say this also, that to have them and always to observe them is injurious, and that to appear to have them is useful; to appear merciful, faithful, humane, religious, upright, and to be so, but with a mind so framed that should you require not to be so, you may be able and know how to change to the opposite.

My view is that it is desirable to be both loved and feared; but it is difficult to achieve both and, if one of them has to be lacking, it is much safer to be feared than loved.

Therefore the best fortress is to be found in the love of the people, for although you may have fortresses they will not save you if you are hated by the people.

The best fortress which a prince can possess is the affection of his people.

For it must be noted, that men must either be caressed or else annihilated; they will revenge themselves for small injuries, but cannot do so for great ones; the injury therefore that we do to a man must be such that we need not fear his vengeance.