Rules for Radicals (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

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Characters/People edit see section history

• Mohandas K. Gandhi: Add a description of this character.
• Abraham Lincoln
• Jawaharlal Nehru
• Sam Adams
• Machiavelli
• Saul Alinsky
• Robert F. Kennedy
• John L. Lewis

Quotes edit see section history

• “The leader goes on to build power to fulfill his desires, to hold and wield the power for purposes both social and personal”

• “The organizer finds his goal in creation of power for others to use”

• “We cannot continue or last in the nihilistic absurdities of our time where nothing we do makes sense”

• “With rare exceptions, our activists and radicals are products of and rebels against our middle-class society. All rebels must attack the power states in their society. Our rebels have contemptuously rejected the values and way of life of the middle class. They have stigmatized it as materialistic, decadent, bourgeois, degenerate, imperialistic, war-mongering, brutalized, and corrupt. They are right; but we must begin from where we are if we are to build power for change, and the power and the people are in the big middle-class majority. Therefore, it is useless self-indulgence for an activist to put his past behind him. Instead, he should realize the priceless value of his middle-class experience. His middle-class identity, his familiarity with the values and problems, are invaluable for organization of his 'own people'. He has the background to go back, examine, and try to understand the middle-class way; now he has a compelling reason to know, for he must know if he is to organize.”

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• Any revolutionary change must be preceded by a passive, affirmative, non-challenging attitude toward change among the mass of our people. They must feel so frustrated, so defeated, so lost, so futureless in the prevailing system that they are willing to let go of the past and chance the future.

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• A revolutionary organizer must shake up the prevailing patterns of their lives—agitate, create disenchantment and discontent with the current values, to produce, if not a passion for change, at least a passive, affirmative, non-challenging climate.

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• A reformation means that masses of our people have reached the point of disillusionment with past ways and values. They don’t know what will work but they do know that the prevailing system is self-defeating, frustrating, and hopeless. They won’t act for change but won’t strongly oppose those who do. The time is then ripe for revolution.

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• The third rule of the ethics of means and ends is that in war the end justifies almost any means.

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• The tenth rule of the ethics of means and ends is that you do what you can with what you have and clothe it with moral garments.

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• The fourth rule of the ethics of means and ends is that judgment must be made in the context of the times in which the action occurred and not from any other chronological vantage point.

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• The fifth rule of the ethics of means and ends is that concern with ethics increases with the number of means available and vice versa.

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• The eighth rule of the ethics of means and ends is that the morality of a means depends upon whether the means is being employed at a time of imminent defeat or imminent victory.

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• The ninth rule of the ethics of means and ends is that any effective means is automatically judged by the opposition as being unethical.

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• The Prince was written by Machiavelli for the Haves on how to hold power. Rules for Radicals is written for the Have-Nots on how to take it away.

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Setting & Locations edit see section history

• Chicago, Illinois
• New York, New York
• United States
• India
• Russia
• Vietnam
• Egypt
• Japan
• Kashmir
• California

First Sentence edit see section history

Table of Contents edit see section history

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Saul D. Alinsky (Author)

First Edition edit see section history

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: Add the Library of Congress Classification.
• Dewey: 303.484

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Nonfiction › Politics › Ideologies › Radical Thought
• Books › Nonfiction › Government › Civics
• Books › Nonfiction › Current Events › Civil Rights & Liberties