Tony Benn Quotes

I sort of feel we have to owe some respect to the process and owe some respect to the electorate and the people who voted Donald Trump, on the assumption that they have something to teach us.

This is the democratic process at work, What you're seeing with this process is the Iraqi people embracing American-style democracy.

You can't afford to hate politics. The politics of this country is democracy. Democracy is by the people, of the people and for the people. The day people stop taking active part in the politics of this country, democracy will not survive.

Politics is about the participation and engagement of the wider citizenry - to miss that point would doom us to irrelevance.

I'm moved to think about the political state of our country right now. Most people who go out and vote have a very clear sense of what's right and wrong. And a lot of those people who don't aren't sure, so they don't go out and vote.

No matter where you stand politically - even if you're unsure of what your political ideology is - it is important to take part in the process of shaping our government.

Voting is a right best exercised by people who have taken time to learn about the issues.

You have citizens who don't understand how government works and they're kind of soured on it. All they do is criticize. They have no idea that they can make things happen.

Organising free and fair elections is more important than the result itself.

You can study government and politics in school, but the best way to really understand the process is to volunteer your time.

The fact that a man is to vote forces him to think.

Voting is the first duty of democracy.

We have to remain vigilant and loud and stay consistently engaged with our representatives and the political process every single day, on both a macro and micro level.

Whatever changes a common man wants to bring in the country, he can bring it through the process of voting.

It's fun to play a part in the process of helping to inform readers about their political leaders.

People often say, with pride, 'I'm not interested in politics.' They might as well say, 'I'm not interested in my standard of living, my health, my job, my rights, my freedoms, my future or any future.' ... If we mean to keep any control over our world and lives, we must be interested in politics.

Perhaps the most important thing I learned was about democracy, that democracy is not our government, our constitution, our legal structure. Too often they are enemies of democracy.

Millions of people are getting the vote, and we have to educate them to keep them from our throats. In other words, we have to train them in obedience and servility, so they're not going to think through the way the world works and come after our throats.

But, Jefferson worried that the people - and the argument goes back to Thucydides and Aristotle - are easily misled. He also stressed, passionately and repeatedly, that it was essential for the people to understand the risks and benefits of government, to educate themselves, and to involve themselves in the political process. Without that, he said, the wolves will take over.

You cannot have a democracy without an informed people.

The survival of democracy depends on the ability of large numbers of people to make realistic choices in the light of adequate information.

Democracy in the contemporary world demands, among other things, an educated and informed people.

Since an early age I was taught to be very politically aware and knew from childhood that the process was something I wanted to contribute towards if I could.

But, you know, I'm sorry, I think democracy requires participation. I mean, I don't want to proselytize but I do feel some sort of duty to participate in the process in some way other than just blindly getting behind a political party.

Let's not give the electoral process so much importance. We have to be cynical about it. Let's give importance to the real democracy that's constructed on a day-to-day basis. That's my hopeful perspective on it.