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John Ralston Saul, CC ist ein kanadischer Autor und Essayist. Von 2009 bis 2015 war er Präsident des PEN International. John Ralston Saul lebt in Toronto. Er ist seit 1999 mit Adrienne Clarkson verheiratet.

Als Essayist ist Saul besonders bekannt für seine Kommentare über das Wesen des Individualismus, der Staatsbürgerschaft und des öffentlichen Gemeinguts. Weitere Themen in seinem essayistischen Werk sind das Versagen von managergeführten Gesellschaften‚ die Konfusion zwischen Führung und Managerialismus , Militärstrategien, insbesondere der irregulären Kriegsführung, die Rolle des Rechts auf freie Meinungsäußerung und seine Kritik an gegenwärtigen Argumenten in ökonomischen Debatten. Wikipedia  

✵ 19. Juni 1947
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John R. Saul: Zitate auf Englisch

“Romans disapproved of Greek sports because the athletes competed nude. That was shocking. On the other hand, people dripping with blood and dying for entertainment was fine. This is strangely similar to the moral standards of today's commercial television and family movies.”

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John Ralston Saul

On Equilibrium (2001)

“[W]e have more than two options… a critique of reason does not have to be a call for the return of superstition and arbitrary power…. [O]ur problems do not lie with reason itself but with our obsessive treatment of reason as an absolute value. Certainly it is one of our qualities, but it functions positively only when balanced and limited by the others.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Instrumental Reason"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“There are two fairly standard approaches to political power used by those who seek it. Some seek power with the assumption that the citizenry are the source of legitimacy and are to be treated with respect. Others concentrate on identifying whatever insecurities there are within the citizenry and on exploiting them.”

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John Ralston Saul

Reflections of a Siamese Twin (1997)

“[G]iven our inability over the past two decades to deal with an unbreakable chain of unemployment, debt, inflation and no real growth, we have drifted farther and farther out into a cold, unfriendly, confusing sea. The new certitude of those in positions of authority — those out of the water — is that the certain answer is to cut away the life preservers.”

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John Ralston Saul buch The Unconscious Civilization

The Unconscious Civilization (1995)

“I would remind you…that Socrates was executed not for saying what things were or should be, but for seeking practical indications of where some reasonable approximation of truth might be. He was executed not for his megalomania or grandiose propositions or certitudes, but for stubbornly doubting the absolute truths of others.”

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John Ralston Saul buch The Unconscious Civilization

The Unconscious Civilization (1995)

“[O]ur élite is primarily and increasingly managerial. A managerial élite manages. A crisis, unfortunately, requires thought. Thought is not a management function.”

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John Ralston Saul buch The Unconscious Civilization

The Unconscious Civilization (1995)

“Just as the unleashing of ideas and myths in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries cleared the way for endless changes in state and social structures, so the subsequent pinning down and splitting up of language into feudal states has now made it impossible for the citizen to participate seriously in society. The inviting humanist irony of the early days has given way to the off-putting rational cynicism and sloganeering of our time.”

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John Ralston Saul

Voltaire's Bastards (1992)

“There is absolutely no reason why we have to deal with the mid-life crisis of our social policies by putting a bullet through their heads.”

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John Ralston Saul

Reflections of a Siamese Twin (1997)

“Each [ideology], in the oppressive air of conformity which ideologies create, will force public figures to conform or be ruined on the scaffold of ridicule. In a society of ideological believers, nothing is more ridiculous than the individual who doubts and does not conform.”

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John Ralston Saul buch The Unconscious Civilization

The Unconscious Civilization (1995)

“Societies grow into systems. The systems require management and are therefore increasingly wielded, like a tool or a weapon, by those who have power. The rest of the population is still needed to do specific things. But the citizens are not needed to contribute to the form or direction of the society. The more "advanced" the civilization, the more irrelevant the citizen becomes.”

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John Ralston Saul

Voltaire's Bastards (1992)

“In the humanist ideal, the mainstream is where interesting debate, the generating of new ideas and creativity take place. In rational society this mainstream is considered uncontrollable and is therefore made marginal. The centre ground is occupied instead by structures and courtiers.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Mainstream"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“The idea underlying such endless discussion and dreaming about the physical act is that sexual expertise confers worldliness and is therefore part of becoming an affirmed individual. This is a curious suggestion… Sex is many things — a need, a desire, an emotion, a release — but it has nothing to do with worldly sophistication, character building or even existential action. Sex, in general, is more of an obstacle than anything else for those who wish to free themselves and act as individuals… [W]e aren't dealing with a successful affirmation of responsible individualism in the real world. We are creating private dreams which compensate for the fracturing of the individual and the castration of his or her power in public life.”

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John Ralston Saul

Voltaire's Bastards (1992)

“An important newspaper baron…explains that the cause of poverty throughout the world is indolence. Ten per cent of Americans would not be on food stamps if they simply worked harder…. If only they had followed his father's advice, they'd have "stuck it to the bastards" and become really rich. This image of hundreds and hundreds of millions of millionaires sticking it to each other, there no longer being any other category of citizen to stick it to, is so all-inclusive that there is no need for others to concern themselves with this word.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Indolence"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“Pessimism: A valuable protection against quackery.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Pessimism"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“Freud, Sigmund: A man so dissatisfied with his own mother and father that he devoted his life to convincing everyone who would listen — or better still, talk — that their parents were just as bad.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Freud"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“The old cliché about having all your eggs in one basket takes on new meaning with Canada and the United States, because there is something even more wrong about having all your eggs in someone else's basket. It is worse still if that country is much larger than you and worst of all if they don't have all their eggs in your basket. This is not a relationship. It is a dependency. Canada's survival will depend largely on its ability to change that dependency back into a relationship. And one of the key factors in doing that will be the redistribution of our trade. But we can't do that if we have no politicians willing to take the lead.”

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John Ralston Saul

Reflections of a Siamese Twin (1997)

“Indeed you can usually tell when the concepts of democracy and citizenship are weakening. There is an increase in the role of charity and in the worship of volunteerism. These represent the élite citizen's imitation of noblesse oblige; that is, of pretending to be aristocrats or oligarchs, as opposed to being citizens.”

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John Ralston Saul

Reflections of a Siamese Twin (1997)

“Today, more than ever, women are occupying positions of influence. However, in the past they have been the exceptions to the rule and were usually obliged to hold on to their power by deforming themselves into honorary men or into magnified archetypes of the female who manipulated men. It still is not clear that women can successfully become part of the established structures without accepting these deformations.”

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John Ralston Saul

Voltaire's Bastards (1992)

“The conclusion drawn by … most of our élites … is that the population constitutes a deep and dangerous well of ignorance and irrationality; if our civilization is in crisis the fault must lie with the populace which is not rising to the inescapable challenges. And yet civilizations do not collapse because the citizenry are corrupt or lazy or anti-intellectual. These people do not have the power and influence to either lead or destroy. Civilizations collapse when those who have power fail to do their jobs.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Anti-Intellectualism"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“[S]hould we attempt to use sensible words to deal with these problems, they will be caught up immediately in the structures of the official arguments which accompany the official modern ideologies — arguments as sterile as the ideologies are irrelevant. Our society contains no method of serious self-criticism for the simple reason that it is now a self-justifying system which generates its own logic.”

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John Ralston Saul

Voltaire's Bastards (1992)

“On June 22nd, [1633, ] in the morning, in the great hall of the Convent of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, Galileo was found guilty of holding a false doctrine. He went down on his knees and both abjured and condemned his own errors. He swore never to argue such doctrines again. It was thus definitely confirmed that the sun did rotate around the earth…Santa Maria Sopra Minerva. Saint Mary Over Minerva. Power over wisdom.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Wisdom"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“But now, in this century of ideologies, the Gods and Destiny have been given new life. "Miracles in the world are many," Sophocles wrote in the fifth century BC. "There is no greater miracle than man." Suddenly, at the end of the twentieth century, we discover that no, after all, it isn't true. Historical inevitability is a greater miracle than man. As is the dialectic. As is the superiority of various groups according to blood type. As is the genius of an abstract mechanism called the market. As is the leadership of inanimate objects — called technology — which worker bees create and then, inevitably, are led by. These inevitabilities are great leaps backward into the arms of the Gods and Destiny.”

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John Ralston Saul buch The Unconscious Civilization

The Unconscious Civilization (1995)

“The recession is over.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

This phrase has been used twice a year since 1973 by government leaders throughout the West. Its meaning is unclear. See: Depression.
"Recession"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“Happy family: The existence and maintenance of [this] is thought to make a politician fit for public office. According to this theory, the public are less concerned by whether or not they are effectively represented than by the need to be assured that the penises and vaginas of public officials are only used in legally sanctioned circumstances.”

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John Ralston Saul The Doubter's Companion

"Happy family"
The Doubter's Companion (1994)

“A referendum is little more than a "rumour of choice."”

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John Ralston Saul

The idea behind the mechanism, ever since its first modern manifestations two centuries ago under Napoleon, has been to replace democracy with the sensation of democracy. That is: to replace the slow, complex, eternally unclear continuity of democracy, and all the awkwardness of citizen participation, with something clear and fast which allows those in power to impose their agenda. Through an apparently simple question with a one-syllable answer, those who ask can get a blank cheque from the citizenry; that is, if they choose their moment well and come up with a winning question.
Reflections of a Siamese Twin (1997)

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