This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
To prevent government from becoming corrupt and tyrannous, its organization and methods should be as simple as possible, its functions be restricted to those necessary to the common welfare, and in all its parts it should be kept as close to the people and as directly within their control as may be.
Control | Government | Organization | People | Government |
Politics, as a practice, whatever its professions, has always been the systematic organization of hatreds.
The great work of the present for every man, and every organization of men, who would improve social conditions, is the work of education—the propagation of ideas. It is only as it aids this that anything else can avail.
Organization | Present | Work |
The methods by which a trade union can alone act, are necessarily destructive; its organization is necessarily tyrannical.
Now, I am not opposed to organizations, but I hold that no organization can lead man to truth. Yet all religious societies, sects, and groups are based on the idea that man can be guided to truth. Organizations should exist for the welfare of man, organizations not divided by nationalities, by class distinctions.
Man | Organization |
In the midst of increasing mechanization and technological organization, propaganda is simply the means used to prevent these things from being felt as too oppressive and to persuade man to submit with good grace. When man will be fully adapted to this technological society, when he will end by obeying with enthusiasm, convinced of the excellence of what he is forced to do, the constraint of the organization will no longer be felt by him; the truth is, it will no longer be a constraint, and the police will have nothing to do. The civic and technological good will and the enthusiasm for the right social myths — both created by propaganda — will finally have solved the problem of man.
Constraint | Enthusiasm | Excellence | Good | Man | Means | Nothing | Organization | Right | Truth | Will | Excellence | Propaganda |
With acquisition there must ever be exploitation; the craving for acquisition must inevitably bring about exploitation. Acquisition is always psychological. When emphasis is laid on you as an acquiring entity, the individual or the collective, there will be always exploitation. This does not mean that we should not organize for the physical welfare of man, but if the organizer uses the organization as a means of acquisition, then he and the organization will become the means of exploitation.
Individual | Means | Organization | Will |
People are an organization's only appreciable asset, but creative people are an organization's most needed asset. Be willing to absorb some risk and failures to allow people freedom to express themselves. Creative leaders inherently know when rules need to be challenged, and they can see when a more flexible approach should be taken. Handle the ideas of your people carefully: If an idea is half-developed but has potential, pass it to the people in your organization who are proven process thinkers and implementers. Sometimes giving your people permission to be creative is not enough; inspire them by modeling creativity. The word 'reactive' and the word 'creative' are made up of exactly the same letters; the only difference between the two is that you 'c' (see) differently.
Freedom | Giving | Ideas | Need | Organization | People | Risk | Thinkers |
Consider who you are working with: Part of the art of leadership is discovering the unique relationship between the needs of the individual and the organization. People only know that you and the organization intend to meet their needs when you tell them so. Determine how to help the person, tell them how you will do it, and follow through – before asking the individual to do things in return for you. People working together ultimately succeed or fail based on their commitment to one another. Never give up easily on one of your people; it does a disservice to that individual and to you.
Art | Commitment | Individual | Organization | People | Relationship | Unique | Will | Art | Leadership |
Create a vision and then ignite your organization to make this vision a reality. Get people so passionate about what they are doing that they cannot wait to execute this plan. Have great energy, competitive spirit and the ability to spark excitement and achieve results. Search for leaders who have the same qualities.
Ability | Excitement | Organization | People | Search | Spirit | Vision |
The better you are at surrounding yourself with people of high potential, the greater your chance for success. Every relationship in your organization will affect you one way or another. Those who do not increase you will inevitably decrease you.
Better | Chance | Organization | People | Relationship | Will |
The problem of social organization is how to set up an arrangement under which greed will do the least harm, capitalism is that kind of a system.
Capitalism | Greed | Organization | Will |
The organization and constant onward sweep of this movement exemplifies the resentment of the many toward the selfishness, greed and the neglect of the few.
Greed | Neglect | Organization | Resentment |
You will find that the State is the kind of organization which, though it does big things badly, does small things badly, too.
Organization | Will |
No feats of heroism are needed to achieve the greatest and most important changes in the existence of humanity; neither the armament of millions of soldiers, nor the construction of new roads and machines, nor the arrangement of exhibitions, nor the organization of workmen's unions, nor revolutions, nor barricades, nor explosions, nor the perfection of aerial navigation; but a change in public opinion. And to accomplish this change no exertions of the mind are needed, nor the refutation of anything in existence, nor the invention of any extraordinary novelty; it is only needful that we should not succumb to the erroneous, already defunct, public opinion of the past, which governments have induced artificially; it is only needful that each individual should say what he really feels or thinks, or at least that he should not say what he does not think.
Change | Existence | Important | Individual | Invention | Mind | Opinion | Organization | Perfection | Public |
In a condition of society and under an industrial organization which places labor completely at the mercy of capital, the accumulations of capital will necessarily be rapid, and an unequal distribution of wealth is at once to be observed.
Labor | Mercy | Organization | Society | Wealth | Will | Society |
Of all the agonies in life, that which is most poignant and harrowing; that which for the time annihilates reason, and leave our whole organization one lacerated, mangled heart, is the conviction that we have been deceived where we placed all the trust of love.
Organization | Time | Trust |
Whenever we seek to avoid the responsibility for our own behavior, we do so by attempting to give that responsibility to some other individual or organization or entity. But this means we then give away our power to that entity.
Individual | Means | Organization | Power | Responsibility |
Absorption and organization of sunlight, the essence of life, takes place almost exclusively within the plants. The organs of the plant are therefore a kind of biological accumulation of light. These are the basis of what we call food, whence animal and human bodies derive their substance and energy. The nutritional energy may thus be, termed organized sunlight energy. Hence sunlight is the driving force of the cells of our body.
Energy | Force | Organization |
We need leaders who add value to the people and the organization they lead; who work for the benefit of others and not just for their own personal gain. Leaders who inspire and motivate, not intimidate and manipulate; who live with people to know their problems in order to solve them and who follow a moral compass that points in the right directions regardless of the trends.
Need | Order | Organization | People | Problems | Right | Work | Value |