C. Wright Mills

Prestige is the shadow of money and power.

To overcome the academic prose you have first to overcome the academic pose.

America is a nation with no truly national city, no Paris, no Rome, no London, no city which is at once the social center, the political capital, and the financial hub.

Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a society can be understood without understanding both.

Not wishing to be disturbed over moral issues of the political economy, Americans cling to the notion that the government is a sort of automatic machine, regulated by the balancing of competing interests.

What ordinary men are directly aware of and what they try to do are bounded by the private orbits in which they live; their visions and their powers are limited.

Power is not of a man. Wealth does not center in the person of the wealthy. Celebrity is not inherent in any personality. To be celebrated, to be wealthy, to have power requires access to major institutions.

Every revolution has its counterrevolution - that is a sign the revolution is for real.

In the world of the celebrity, the hierarchy of publicity has replaced the hierarchy of descent and even of great wealth.

The nearest the modern general or admiral comes to a small-arms encounter of any sort is at a duck hunt in the company of corporation executives at the retreat of Continental Motors, Inc.

People with advantages are loath to believe that they just happen to be people with advantages.

The aim of the college for the individual student is to eliminate the need in his life for the college the task is to help him become a self educating man.

The principal cause of war is war itself.