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As Gandhi famously responded when asked about Western civilization, I wish they had one, the same applies to international community: I wish there was one.

Richard A. Falk

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Richard A. Falk
Age: 94
Born: 1930
Born: November 13
Human Rights Activist
Peace Activist
Professor
University Teacher
New York City
New York
Richard A. Falk
Western
International
Civilization
Asked
Community
Famously
Wish
Responded
Gandhi
Applies

More quotes by Richard A. Falk

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Nothing is more important than restoring a high degree of autonomy to educational experiences so that those who grow up in this society and troubled world have the best available tools to grasp the challenges that imperil our national and human future.
Richard A. Falk
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I don't like to end my talk with a 700 million dollar loss, even if it shows the importance of Numerical Analysis.
Richard A. Falk
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The systemic incompatibility between free-market capitalism and the quality of democratic life and respect for human rights has to be modified to take account of such contextual variables as wartime, security threats, and the societal balance between entrepreneurial and working classes.
Richard A. Falk
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The British leadership has acknowledged that it only became possible to end the violence in North Ireland when it stopped thinking of the [Irish Republican Army] as a terrorist organization and began treating it as a political actor with genuine grievances that deserved to be addressed.
Richard A. Falk
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Hamas retains the right to defend Gaza by the use of the weaponry at its disposal, and is thus not committed to nonviolence, but it does offer the possibility of greater peace and stability for both Israelis and Palestinians if the label of terrorism was abandoned and the search for accommodation was commenced in good faith.
Richard A. Falk
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An aggravating feature of this post-9/11 atmosphere is to cast suspicions on Muslims and on Islam as a religion that is interpreted as either inherently violent or death-oriented, with a particular animus against America and Americans.
Richard A. Falk
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I can only hope that Trump comes to realize the grave dangers of adopting a policy of confrontation toward Iran. Among these dangers is the likelihood that hardliners would again gain the upper hand in the governing process in Tehran, and the moderates who have sought to end national and regional tensions would be marginalized, or worse.
Richard A. Falk
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The capitalist priority is efficiency of capital and profitability, which is generally inconsistent with protecting the vulnerabilities of people and nature.
Richard A. Falk
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It should be appreciated that this whole effort to hold leaders of states criminally responsible is a rather radical challenge to territorial sovereignty and a repudiation of the whole related ethos of 'sovereign immunity'.
Richard A. Falk
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I think the impacts of 9/11 on academic freedom vary greatly depending on locale and time (softening with the passage of time), and even within the same community, and likely within the same schools. This variability makes it difficult to offer generalized responses without accompanying caveats.
Richard A. Falk
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On the one side, I welcome prosecutions of individuals such as Pinochet, and would welcome the indictment, prosecution, and punishment of Kissinger. On the other side is the geopolitical reality that only those in the global South are likely to experience the impact of Universal Jurisdiction.
Richard A. Falk
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Capitalism is in crisis both morally, due to widening disparities of income and wealth and disclosures of abusive practices, and ecologically, due to its refusal to make business adjustments in accounting procedures that pass the consequences of emissions to the public and the future.
Richard A. Falk
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Both Israel and the United States have mounted attacks on 'lawfare', that is, counter-hegemonic uses of international law to question policies associated with the occupation of Palestine and criminal tactics of warfare.
Richard A. Falk
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Trump's election is generally bad news.... In international policy, one can imagine that if Trump were foolish enough to go ahead with his pledge to move the American Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, it would be widely experienced throughout the Islamic world as a provocation.
Richard A. Falk
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We should not rule out the possibility that Trump's diplomacy could deescalate Middle East strife and international tensions, give the US a lower global profile and enable a more balanced world order to emerge, doing most of its damage here at home, through moves to implement his vision of nativist nationalism.
Richard A. Falk
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Cumulatively, American society is sliding toward a new form of 'authoritarian democracy'. Elections continue, free speech is generally protected, institutions operate in accordance with the Constitution, but the reality of state - society relations is dramatically altered by the counter-terrorist claims of emergency rule and the right of exception.
Richard A. Falk
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The Goldstone Report establishes the credibility of the accusations directed at Israel with respect to its tactics used during the 2008 - 09 attacks on Gaza, but was not able to facilitate the next step that would have involved activating accountability mechanisms either within Israel or at the level of international society.
Richard A. Falk
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It is possible that, in fact, Trump's call for America First (despite evoking unpleasant recollections that such a phrase was the invention of those in the 1930s harboring fascist sympathies) and a positive relationship with Russia, might lead [to] a more relaxed global setting.
Richard A. Falk
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To be a hegemon is inherently ambiguous, usually implying some mixture of dominance and legitimacy, that is, being seen as contributing global leadership in a generally benevolent manner.
Richard A. Falk
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The UDHR has become an iconic document over the course of more than six decades, the starting point for discussions of whether or not the rights as set forth are truly universal or slanted to reflect the hegemony of Western values, especially those associated with liberal individualism.
Richard A. Falk