"The discovery of society is thus either the end or the rebirth of freedom. While the fascist resigns himself to relinquishing freedom and glorifies power which is the reality of society, the socialist resigns himself to that reality and upholds the claim to freedom, in spite of it. Man becomes mature and able to exist as a human being in a complex society. To quote once more Robert Owen’s inspired words: “Should any causes of evil be irremovable by the new powers which men are about to acquire, they will know that they are necessary and unavoidable evils; and childish, unavailing complaints will cease to be made.” Resignation was ever the fount of man’s strength and new hope. Man accepted the reality of death and built the meaning of his bodily life upon it. He resigned himself to the truth that he had a soul to lose and that there was worse than death, and founded his freedom upon it. He resigns himself, in our time, to the reality of society which means the end of that freedom. But, again, life springs from ultimate resignation. Uncomplaining acceptance of the reality of society gives man indomitable courage and strength to remove all removable injustice and unfreedom. As long as he is true to his task of creating more abundant freedom for all, he need not fear that either power or planning will turn against him and destroy the freedom he is building by their instrumentality. This is the meaning of freedom in a complex society; it gives us all the certainty that we need."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Historians from the United StatesImmigrants to the United StatesAnthropologists from the United StatesSociologists from the United StatesEconomists from Hungary
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Ch. 21 : Freedom in a Complex Society
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Karl_Polanyi
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Karl Polanyi
Karl Paul Polanyi (October 25, 1886 – April 23, 1964) was a Hungarian-American economic historian, economic anthropologist, political economist, historical sociologist and social philosopher.
75 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Karl Polanyi →
Related Quotes
"Bentham possessed neither the sleek complacency of a Townsend nor the all too precipitate historicism of a Burke, Rat…"
"The change of atmosphere from Adam Smith to Townsend was, indeed, striking. The former marked the close of an age whi…"
"A bare outline of the objective nature of Fascism thus tends to support our interpretation of its philosophy. The Fas…"
"Nineteenth-century civilization rested on four institutions. The first was the balance-of-power system which for a ce…"
"Both the personnel and the motives of this singular body invested it with a status the roots of which were securely g…"
"The true nature of the international system under which we were living was not realized until it failed. Hardly anyon…"
"At the heart of the Industrial Revolution of the eighteenth century there was an almost miraculous improvement in the…"
"Enclosures have appropriately been called a revolution of the rich against the poor. The lords and nobles were upsett…"
"The Industrial Revolution was merely the beginning of a revolution as extreme and radical as ever inflamed the minds …"
"Edmund Burke was a man of different stature. Where men like Townsend failed in a small way, he failed in a great way.…"