Politics is just a name for the way we get things done … without fighting. We dicker and compromise and everybody thinks he has received a raw deal, but somehow after a tedious amount of talk we come up with some jury-rigged way to do it without getting anybody’s head bashed in. That’s politics.

Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer

Podkayne of Mars, ch. 4 [Tom Fries], Worlds of IF magazine (1962-11)
    (Source)

This section of the first magazine installment of three was collected as ch. 4 of the novel (1963).