Amitai Etzioni Quotes
Strong rights presume strong responsibilities.
Amitai Etzioni, Co-Founder, Communitarian Party, Quoted in New York Times, May 24, 1992
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
In the internecine warfare in the Iraq War many of the Iraqis who worked with and for the United States during the war, were threatened and many killed. Unlike the Ford Administration in the Vietnam War, which had resettled almost 200,000 Asians who had worked with America and were in danger of retaliation, the George W. Bush Administration would not allow the people who were loyal to United States forces in the war to immigrate to the U. S.
Note that the two do NOT ALWAYS coincide. There are those who argue that law should be respected, right or wrong. There are also those who argue that law should be respected, only when it is in the right. Note also that “respect” and “obedience” are two different things. Some people argue that law and the courts and government must have respect. Others that they are only due obedience but not necessarily respect when they are in the wrong. Still others, like Thoreau, that obedience even is not required when the law is wrong. There are those who take this to the degree that obedience to a “wrong” law is wrong and there is a DUTY to disobey a wrong law. However, a more nuanced view does not treat all laws as the same importance. I may think a particular tax is unjust and wrong, but obedience does not necessarily have moral consequences. A law that says that people with a certain religion must not be hired, however, is sufficiently immoral that I am obliged to disobey it.
Amitai Etzioni is a German-born Israeli and American sociologist, best known for his work on socioeconomics and communitarianism. He founded the Communitarian Network, a non-profit, non-partisan organization dedicated to supporting the moral, social, and political foundations of society.
