Belief in liberal freedom and democracy is always belief in it in a particular place, in a national home with histories that… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
I'd always admired the intellectuals who had made the transition into politics - Mario Vargas Llosa in Peru, Vaclav Havel in the… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
I've always thought Anne-Marie Slaughter would make a fantastic United States Senator or something. She's a real intellectual, but she's got enormous… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
Democratic constitutions do allow some suspension of rights in states of emergency. Thus rights are not always trumps. But neither is necessity.… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
What everybody forgets is that when I was a journalist in Britain and in the United States, I was always a Canadian.… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
Politics is intensely physical: your hands touch, clasp and hold, and your eyes are always reaching for contact. None of this came… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
I teach students that what people say about failure in politics is mostly wrong. People always told me, 'They'll praise you on… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
I went into politics thinking that, if I made arguments in good faith, I'd get a hearing. It's a reasonable assumption, but… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
The Only cure for nihilism is for liberal democratic societies - their electorates, their judiciary, and their political leadership- to insist that force is… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
What really matters is getting new people in. The constitutional changes matter, but the thing that the party mustn't do is turn in on… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
The medium's gaze is brief, intense, and promiscuous. The shelf life of the moral causes it makes its own is brutally short. — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
Those with a gift for action, for their part, often express contempt for those whose gifts are more reflective. Men of action like to… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
There are lots of nations in the world or national peoples who don't yet have states. They're inside someone else's state and they want… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
There's a civic nationalism in Britain and dozens of other countries. — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
Affirming belief that America is an exceptional nation has become a test of patriotism in American politics. — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
Both Iraq and Syria are a fissile mixture of ethnicities and religions thrown together after Versailles by departing French and British imperialists and only… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
The legitimacy of coercive acts in a democracy arises from the process by which they are justified and by the degree to which we… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
Some of our finest leaders were not intellectuals at all, and I admire them enormously because they weren't. Harry Truman wasn't. — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
If you get the access to see history happen, do you understand the history when it does happen? And the answer to that question… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
I have been a journalist, off and on, since I was 17. I was a copy boy for the 'New York Times,' when it… — Michael Ignatieff Copy Share Image
