Mikhail Gorbachev Quotes

In this age of growing interconnectedness, we understand that turning our backs on the world is simply not an option.

We can't return to the 19th century, draw up our drawbridges and say, we don't have anything to do with each other, Germany will not work with the Netherlands, the UK will not work with France. That's ludicrous. We are condemned to work with each other.

No one can live entirely on their own, nor can any country or society exist in isolation.

No country can be an island unto itself or world unto itself. Not even the biggest country.

The age of isolation is gone. And gone are the days in which barbed wire served as demarcation lines, separating and isolating countries from one another. No country can escape looking beyond its boundaries to find the source of the currents which influence how it can live with others.

However fragmented the world, however intense the national rivalries, it is an inexorable fact that we become more interdependent every day. I believe that national sovereignties will shrink in the face of universal interdependence. The sea, the great unifier, is man's only hope. Now, as never before, the old phrase has a literal meaning: We are all in the same boat.

in today's world no country can be absolutely independent of another. It is a world of interdependence.

Our world and our lives have become increasingly interdependent, so when our neighbour is harmed, it affects us too. Therefore we have to abandon outdated notions of 'them' and 'us' and think of our world much more in terms of a great 'US', a greater human family.

We live in an inter-dependent world. An isolated India is not in our interest. Just because we are a large country, we cannot be arrogant and think that we can ignore others. We live in a different era. Terrorism is global and can come from even remote countries. International summits and organizations like WTO take decisions which will bind us and if we are not present in such summits, we may be hurt by the decisions taken.

To contrast national solidarity and international cooperation as two opposites seems foolish to me.

The forces that are driving mankind toward unity and peace are deep-seated and powerful. They are material and natural, as well as moral and intellectual.

It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.

However fragmented the world, however intense the national rivalries, it is an inexorable fact that we become more interdependent every day.

Here we encounter two conflicting concepts with which we must come to grips in our time: the idea of national solidarity and the idea of international cooperation.

Interdependence is a fact, it's not an opinion.

You can't carve up the world. It's not a pie.

If September 11th has taught us anything, it's certainly that the world has never been so interdependent. It is impossible now to be an island of prosperity in a sea of despair.

No part of the human community can live entirely on its own planet, with its own laws of motion and cut off from the rest of humanity.

I have long believed this interdependence defines the new world we live in.

We have to move from our devotion to independence, through an understanding of interdependence

We have learned that we cannot live alone, at peace; that our own well-being is dependent on the well-being of other nations far away. We have learned that we must live as men, not as ostriches

For weal or for woe, the peoples of mankind are knit together far closer than ever before..

I know how inter-dependent the world is.

Mankind is interdependent, and the happiness of each depends upon the happiness of all, and it is this lesson that humanity has to learn today as the first and the last lesson.

Daily the world grows smaller, leaving understanding the only place where peace can find a home.