Joyce Appleby Quotes

I can't imagine a society with absolutely no solidarity. For me, it's a nightmare. And I don't want to live in a place like that.

Earlier pluralist societies destroyed themselves because no one took care of the common good. They abounded in communities but could not sustain community, let alone create it.

We know that there can never be any solid friendship between individuals, or union between communities that is worth the name, unless the parties be persuaded of each other’s honesty.

the more our societies grow, the more important trust becomes and the harder it is to build. And that is a paradox of modern societies.

We need to rediscover the idea of the common good and work together to build a home.

Free people make the only milieu possible in society for the full gift of one's self to church, state, and family. Free people enjoy and sustain and feel with one another because they live for one another. The paths of life are intermingled lives.

There can be hope only for a society which acts as one big family, not as many separate ones.

The notion of 'we' is very important. I think, for any family, any community to be able to say 'we' in this family, it means something. It's dangerous to society when somebody will place himself or herself on the outside of 'we.'

People are not considerate of others. They tend not to consider themselves as all living together, but see themselves only as individuals.

It Takes A Village

It is a community of purpose that constitutes society.

All people owe their lives to surrounding society.

A people cannot exist if there is no social solidarity.

What I argued in 'The Great Divide' is that societies can't function without trust, both politically and economically.

I pay my tax in the belief that you pay yours. I pay for your doctor's visit, in the belief that you pay for mine. In Denmark we don't have gold mines, but we have something more important. We have trust in one another.

Anarchy would be a world that nobody felt responsible for, that nobody felt any sort of love for. When there's real intelligence happening, when there's real love happening, there's a sense of responsibility: Hey, we've got to take care of this place and each other.

Community isn't something I ever take for granted.

The feeling of community… is really what gives a sense, a purpose to a society.

When I am talking about "It Takes a Village", I'm obviously not talking just about or even primarily about geographical villages any longer, but about the network of relationships and values that do connect us and binds us together.

It is that fundamental belief, it is that fundamental belief, I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper that makes this country work. It’s what allows us to pursue our individual dreams and yet still come together as one American family. E pluribus unum. Out of many, one.

Society is the union of men and not the men themselves.

Perhaps if we all subscribed to the African concept of Ubuntu - that we all become people through other people, and that we cannot be fully human alone, we could learn a lot. There'd be less hatred and more harmony.

I'm not a big 'me' guy. I'm a 'we' guy. It's the way I was raised.

There has to be a social commitment, a social consciousness that joins men together. On the basis of their coming together, they do not transgress against themselves and they do not transgress against others.

For too long in this society, we have celebrated unrestrained individualism over common community.