This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
Methods of production, standards of consumption, criteria of success or failure, systems of values, and behavior patterns establish themselves in poor countries which, being (doubtfully) appropriate only to conditions of affluence already achieved, fix the poor countries ever more inescapably in a condition of utter dependence on the rich.
Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara
Many will call me an adventurer - and that I am, only one of a different sort: one of those who risks his skin to prove his platitudes.
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After that I could never pass a dead man without stopping to gaze on his face, stripped by death of that earthly patina which masks the living soul. And I would ask, who were you? Where was your home? Who is mourning for you now?
Day | Evolution | Important | Man | People | Phenomena | Science | Truths |
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
I believe, therefore, that the best way to make contact with the essential problem is by speaking of technology: economic development in poverty-stricken areas can be fruitful only on the basis of what I have called "intermediate technology." In the end, intermediate technology will be "labor-intensive" and will lend itself to the use of small-scale establishments
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
Now that man has acquired the physical means of self-obliteration, the question of peace obviously looms larger than ever before in human history. And how could peace be built without some assurance of permanence with regard to our economic life?
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E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
On the basis of experience and conscious thought small ideas may easily be dislodged, but when it comes to bigger, more universal or more subtle ideas it may not be so easy to change them. Indeed, it is often difficult to become aware of them, as they are the instruments and not the results of our thinking—just as you can see what is outside you, but cannot easily see that with which you see, the eye itself.
Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara
Every day People straighten up the hair, why not the heart?
Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara
If your heart vibrate looking Resist oppression then silence is a form of treason because
Beauty | Life | Life | People | Spirit | Understanding | Will | Beauty |
Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara
Words that do not match deeds are unimportant.
Change | Ignominy | Inevitable | Order | People | Protest | System |
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
As the world's resources of non-renewable fuels—coal, oil, and natural gas—are exceedingly unevenly distributed over the globe and undoubtedly limited in quantity, it is clear that their exploitation at an ever-increasing rate is an act of violence against nature which must almost inevitably lead to violence between men.
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
In this respect, the idea of private enterprise fits exactly into the idea of The Market, which, in an earlier chapter, I called "the institutionalization of individualism and non-responsibility."
Dignity | Land | Money | People | Question | Regard | Will |
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
The cultivation and expansion of needs is the antithesis of wisdom. It is also the antithesis of freedom and peace. Every increase in needs tends to increase one's dependence on outside forces over which one cannot have control, and therefore increases existential fear. Only by a reduction of needs can one promote a genuine reduction in those tensions which are the ultimate causes of strife and war.
Attention | Economics | People | Problems | System | Thinking | Thought | Will | Wisdom | Thought |
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
The effort needed to sustain a way of life which seeks to attain the optimal pattern of consumption is likely to be much smaller than the effort needed to sustain a drive for maximum consumption.
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
What is to take the place of the soul and life-destroying metaphysics inherited from the nineteenth century? The task of our generation, I have no doubt, is one of metaphysical reconstruction… Our task – and the task of all education – is to understand the present world, the world in which we live and make our choices.
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
Excellent! This is real life, full of antinomies and bigger than logic. Without order, planning, predictability, central control, accountancy, instructions to the underlings, obedience, discipline—without these, nothing fruitful can happen, because everything disintegrates. And yet—without the magnanimity of disorder, the happy abandon, the entrepreneurship venturing into the unknown and incalculable, without the risk and the gamble, the creative imagination rushing in where bureaucratic angels fear to tread—without this, life is a mockery and a disgrace.
Ends | Guidance | Need | People | Science | Wisdom | Work | Guidance | Value |
Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara
Every person has the truth in his heart. No matter how complicated his circumstances, no matter how others look at him from the outside, and no matter how deep or shallow the truth dwells in his heart, once his heart is pieced with a crystal needle, the truth will gush forth like a geyser.
E. F. Schumacher, fully Ernst Friedrich "Fritz" Schumacher
There is nothing in the experience of the last twenty-five years to suggest that modern technology, as we know it, can really help us to alleviate world poverty, not to mention the problem of unemployment…we had better fact the question of technology - what does it do and that should it do? Can we develop a technology which really helps us to solve our problems – a technology with a human face?
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Che Guevara, fully Ernesto “Che” Guevara
I am not interested in dry economic socialism. We are fighting against misery, but we are also fighting against alienation. One of the fundamental objectives of Marxism is to remove interest, the factor of individual interest, and gain, from people's psychological motivations. Marx was preoccupied both with economic factors and with their repercussions on the spirit. If communism isn't interested in this too, it may be a method of distributing goods, but it will never be a revolutionary way of life.
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