Business Quote by Sándor Márai
““The whole business of the bourgeois and the class war was different from what we proles were told. These people were sure they had a role in the world; I don't mean just in business, copying those people who had had great power when they themselves had little power. What they believed was that when it came down to it, they were putting the world into some sort of order, that with them in charge, the lords of the world would not be such great lords as they had been and the proles would not remain in abject poverty, as we once were. They thought the whole world would eventually accept their values; that even while one group moved down and another one up, they, the bourgeois, would keep their position - even in a world where everything was being turned upside down.””
About This Quote
Source Novel: The Man Who Loved the World, 1935
The bourgeois claim to order masks their desire to maintain power, even as society upheavals.
In simple terms: Rich claim to bring order but keep power.
Key Takeaway
Question power structures.
Themes
politics
class
power dynamics
Mood
critical
thought‑provoking
Type
philosophical
analytical
When to use this quote
- political debates
- social movements
- economic policy
- historical analysis
- education curricula
Key Concepts
elitism
social hierarchy
revolutionary change
Questions to Reflect On
- Who benefits from claimed order?
- Can true equality arise without upheaval?
A Different Perspective
Power may be justified as stability.
![“[Capitalism assumed] that from the beginning all men are equal. If that were so everyone would be equipped with the same working power, the same education and, above all, the same economic assets … each person would [then] have only himself to blame if he did not succeed.” quote by Knut Wicksell](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/5fb/knut-wicksell-254225_capitalism_capitalism-assumed-that-from-the-beginni_1738320.jpg)
![“In the old days [it ran], before the glorious Revolution, London was not the beautiful city that we know today. It was a dark, dirty, miserable place where hardly anybody had enough to eat and where hundreds and thousands of poor people had no boots on their feet and not even a roof to sleep…” quote by George Orwell](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/2a7/george-orwell-57_money_in-the-old-days-it-ran-before-the-glorio_848583.jpg)
![“[S]ometimes, when you are a food person, the possible irrelevance of what you are doing doesn’t cross your mind until it’s too late. (Once, for example, when I was just starting out in the food business, I was hired by the caper people to develop a lot of recipes using capers, and it was weeks of…” quote by Nora Ephron](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/d79/nora-ephron-1217_business_s-ometimes-when-you-are-a-food-person-th_980.jpg)
![“If the State does not acquire supremacy over [vast private] enterprises, it becomes their puppet, and they become the real State.” quote by Bertrand Russell](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/bad/bertrand-russell-69_acquire_if-the-state-does-not-acquire-supremacy_1379.jpg)