WIST Quotations

Drucker, Peter F. -- The Concept of the Corporation, Part 2, ch. 1 (1946)

Dave — Fri, 28 Aug 2026 17:07:50 +0000

No institution can possibly survive if it needs geniuses or supermen to manage it. It must be organized in such a way as to be able to get along under a leadership composed of average human beings.

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) Austrian-American business consultant
The Concept of the Corporation, Part 2, ch. 1 (1946)

Drucker returned to this concept in a later book, The Effective Executive, ch. 1 (1966), where he wrote (about finding such things):

But we are not going to breed a new race of supermen. We will have to run our organizations with men as they are.

Berry, Wendell -- Essay (2000), “The Total Economy,” Citizenship Papers (2003)

Dave — Mon, 16 Feb 2026 17:27:12 +0000

The folly at the root of this foolish economy began with the idea that a corporation should be regarded, legally, as “a person.” But the limitless destructiveness of this economy comes about precisely because a corporation is not a person. A corporation, essentially, is a pile of money to which a number of persons have sold their moral allegiance. Unlike a person, a corporation does not age. It does not arrive, as most persons finally do, at a realization of the shortness and smallness of human lives; it does not come to see the future as the lifetime of the children and grandchildren of anybody in particular.

Wendell Berry (b. 1934) American farmer, educator, poet, conservationist
Essay (2000), “The Total Economy,” Citizenship Papers (2003)

Bierce, Ambrose -- “Incorporation,” “Devil’s Dictionary” column, San Francisco Wasp (1885-10-03)

Dave — Tue, 20 Jan 2026 22:26:19 +0000

INCORPORATION, n. The act of uniting several persons into one fiction called a corporation, in order that they may be no longer responsible for its actions. A, B and C are a corporation. A robs, B steals and C (it is necessary that there be one gentleman in the concern) cheats. It is a plundering, thieving, swindling corporation. But A, B and C, who have jointly determined and severally executed every crime of the corporation, are blameless. It is wrong to mention them by name when censuring their acts as a corporation, but right when praising.

Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914?) American writer and journalist
“Incorporation,” “Devil’s Dictionary” column, San Francisco Wasp (1885-10-03)

Not collected in later books.

Jacobs, Jane -- Dark Age Ahead, ch. 6 (2004)

Dave — Mon, 01 Apr 2024 18:49:15 +0000

Advanced cultures are usually sophisticated enough, or have been sophisticated enough at some point in their pasts, to realize that foxes shouldn’t be relied on to guard henhouses.

Jane Jacobs (1916–2006) American-Canadian journalist, author, urban theorist, activist
Dark Age Ahead, ch. 6 (2004)

On business regulation, versus self-policing.

Ford, Henry -- My Life and Work, ch. 11 “Money and Goods” (1922) [with Samuel Crowther]

Dave — Wed, 18 Oct 2023 21:00:08 +0000

Money is only a tool in business. It is just a part of the machinery. You might as well borrow 100,000 lathes as $100,000 if the trouble is inside your business. More lathes will not cure it; neither will more money. Only heavier doses of brains and thought and wise courage can cure. A business that misuses what it has will continue to misuse what it can get.

Henry Ford (1863–1947) American industrialist
My Life and Work, ch. 11 “Money and Goods” (1922) [with Samuel Crowther]

Fussell, Paul -- “The Initial Shock,” Interview by Sheldon Hackney, Humanities (Nov/Dec 1996)

Dave — Thu, 10 Jun 2021 19:06:06 +0000

I’m a pacifist about certain things. I’m a pacifist in the way I define national interest. I use this example frequently: If the Mexicans decided to cross the Texas border with firearms, I would be down there in a moment with a rifle and a whistle to direct the troops to repel them. If the United States is attacked, I will defend it. My problem is the United States’ defending the interests of the Union Oil Company or the United Fruit Company. Those are not American interests. They’re private-money interests, and that bothers me a great deal.

Paul Fussell (1924–2012) American cultural and literary historian, author, academic
“The Initial Shock,” Interview by Sheldon Hackney, Humanities (Nov/Dec 1996)

Deming, W. Edwards -- The New Economics for Industry, Government, Education, ch. 3 “Introduction to a System” (1993)

Dave — Thu, 13 Aug 2020 18:53:41 +0000

A system must be managed. It will not manage itself. Left to themselves in the Western world, components become selfish, competitive, independent profit centres, and thus destroy the system. The secret is cooperation between components toward the aim of the organization. We can not afford the destructive effect of competition.

W. Edwards Deming (1900–1993) American management consultant, educator
The New Economics for Industry, Government, Education, ch. 3 “Introduction to a System” (1993)

Bird, Brad -- Interview with Drew Tailor, IndieWire (20 Dec 2011)

Dave — Wed, 05 Feb 2020 17:26:18 +0000

If you explain the basics of any one of these ideas, they probably will sound as nutty as a cooking French rat or a silent film starring robots in a post-apocalyptic world. Each one of those films, when we were in preparation on them, the financial community said each one of them stunk and none of them had the ability to be a financial success. And then the film would come out and they’d go, “Well, they did it that time but the next one sounds like a piece of crap.”

Brad Bird (b. 1957) American director, animator and screenwriter [Phillip Bradley Bird]
Interview with Drew Tailor, IndieWire (20 Dec 2011)

Ackoff, Russell -- “A Concept of Corporate Planning” (1969)

Dave — Thu, 19 Feb 2015 14:45:41 +0000

Recently I asked three corporate executives what decisions they had made in the last year that they would not have made were it not for their it not for their corporate plans. All had difficulty in identifying one such decision. Since each of their plans were marked “secret” or “confidential,” I asked them how their competitors might benefit from the possession of their plans. Each answered with embarrassment that their competitors would not benefit. Yet these executives were strong advocates of corporate planning.

Russell L. Ackoff (1919–2009) American organizational theorist, consultant, management scientist
“A Concept of Corporate Planning” (1969)

Brandeis, Louis -- Liggett Co. v. Lee, 288 U.S. 517 (1933) [dissent]

Dave — Tue, 18 Nov 2014 12:55:42 +0000

The prevalence of the corporation in America has led men of this generation to act, at times, as if the privilege of doing business in corporate form were inherent in the citizen; and has led them to accept the evils attendant upon the free and unrestricted use of the corporate mechanism as if these evils were the inescapable price of civilized life, and, hence to be borne with resignation.

Louis Brandeis (1856–1941) American lawyer, jurist, activist; US Supreme Court Justice (1916–39)
Liggett Co. v. Lee, 288 U.S. 517 (1933) [dissent]

Roosevelt, Theodore -- Speech, San Francisco (14 Sep 1912)

Dave — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 14:19:41 +0000

The only way in which our people can increase their power over the big corporation that does wrong, the only way in which they can protect the working man in his conditions of work and life, the only way in which the people can prevent children working in industry or secure women an eight-hour day in industry, or secure compensation for men killed or crippled in industry, is by extending, instead of limiting, the powers of government.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer; US President (1901–09)
Speech, San Francisco (14 Sep 1912)

Roosevelt, Theodore -- Speech (1910-08-31), “The New Nationalism,” John Brown Memorial Park dedication, Osawatomie, Kansas

Dave — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 12:55:46 +0000

For every special interest is entitled to justice, but not one is entitled to a vote in Congress, to a voice on the bench, or to representation in any public office. The Constitution guarantees protections to property, and we must make that promise good. But it does not give the right of suffrage to any corporation.

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, statesman, conservationist, writer; US President (1901–09)
Speech (1910-08-31), “The New Nationalism,” John Brown Memorial Park dedication, Osawatomie, Kansas

Heinlein, Robert A. -- Story (1939), “Life-Line”

Dave — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 09:50:30 +0000

There has grown up in the minds of certain groups in this country the notion that because a man or corporation has made a profit out of the public for a number of years, the government and the courts are charged with the duty of guaranteeing such profit in the future, even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary to public interest. This strange doctrine is not supported by statute or common law. Neither individuals nor corporations have any right to come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped, or turned back.

Robert A. Heinlein (1907–1988) American writer
Story (1939), “Life-Line”

See Bastiat (1845).

Bierce, Ambrose -- “Corporation,” The Cynic’s Word Book (1906)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 18:00:00 +0000

CORPORATION, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility.

Ambrose Bierce (1842–1914?) American writer and journalist
“Corporation,” The Cynic’s Word Book (1906)

Included in The Devil's Dictionary (1911).

Barry, Dave -- Dave Barry Turns 40, ch. 8 “Time Management” (1990)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Meetings are an addictive, highly self-indulgent activity that corporations and other large organizations habitually engage in only because they cannot actually masturbate.

Dave Barry (b. 1947) American humorist, author, columnist
Dave Barry Turns 40, ch. 8 “Time Management” (1990)