Andrew Neil Quotes

I don't campaign for the end of the aristocracy or the upper classes; I don't really want to destroy anything at all. I just want more plurality.

If education does not create a need for the best in life, then we are stuck in an undemocratic, rigid caste society.

Political power is now widely diffused; and whatever may be the evils of democracy, this good has come of it, that it has forced men to open their eyes to the misery of the masses, and to inquire more zealously as to the possibility of a better distribution of wealth.

The United States was founded on a revolution that abolished the monarchy, aristocracy, titles and primogeniture. Britain may be able in the future to become a more equal and open society while retaining all of these things. But this has yet to be proved.

Nelson Mandela understood that social transformation and economic transformation go hand in hand.

As class barriers tumbled and Britain became a more meritocratic society, young, well-educated Scots were best placed to exploit the new social mobility.

Caste coalitions will disintegrate in front of good governance.

I don't care who the president is - it ain't just all about who's black or who's white or who's Republican or Democrat, it's about who is for the betterment of people, period.

Our aristocracy, unlike that of Europe, is open to all comers.

You don't choose a party because it's the flavour of the month. I feel I will be able to work under a political system. I feel if people like me don't enter politics to bring change, who will?

Reform is China's second revolution.

My feeling is, having lived in different classes, that people want equality of opportunity... that's the thing that makes me despair: the idea that people aren't given equality of opportunity.

Politics is repetition. It is not change. Change is something beyond what we call politics. Change is the essence politics is supposed to be the means to bring into being.

Perhaps the best definition of progress would be the continuing efforts of men and women to narrow the gap between the convenience of the powers that be and the unwritten charter.

I really do think the things that make our society what it is are under threat. It should be about everyone having the potential to be what they're going to be.

That a peasant may become king does not render the kingdom democratic.

In the early period of American History the office sought the man. Today various kinds of people seek the office.

Our democracy may have an aristocracy of talent, as Jefferson said – which is fine – but we don’t want everyone else to be left out. Something like that seems to be happening, though.

On the battlefield, there is no distinction between upper and lower class.

You can't find your way to social reform through the forces that made social reform necessary.

The notion that all human beings born into this world enter at birth into a definite social and economic classification, in which classification they must remain permanently through life, is wholly false and fatal to a progressive civilization.

Our goal is a classless society.

There is no question that in the next thirty or forty years a Negro can achieve the position ... of President of the United States.

You cannot change the psychology of a people by a coup d'etat, or by some quick process of political chemistry convert an idle nobleman into a serious worker, or a medical student into a full-blown statesman.

If a [democratic] society displays less brilliance than an aristocracy, there will also be less wretchedness.