The Bottom Billion Quotes

“Elections determine who is in power, but they do not determine how power is used.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Rebels usually have something to complain about, and if they don't they make it up. All too often the really disadvantaged are in no position to rebel; they just suffer quietly.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“You are a citizen, and citizenship carries responsibilities.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Without an informed electorate, politicians will continue to use the bottom billion merely for photo opportunities, rather than promoting real transformation.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Change in the societies at the very bottom must come predominantly from within; we cannot impose it on them.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Launching a turnaround takes courage. I cannot measure that and so it is not going to be included in my analysis, but behind the moments of change there are always a few people within these societies who have decided to try to make a difference.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Most conduct is guided by norms rather than by laws. Norms are voluntary and are effective because they are enforced by peer pressure.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“The aid agencies are not run by fools. they are full of intelligent people severely constrained by what public opinion permits.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Electorates tend to get the politicians they deserve.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“And so a miserable but possible scenario is that countries in the bottom billion oscillate between the traps and limbo, perhaps switching in the process from one trap to another..

Let me be clear: we cannot rescue them. The societies of the bottom billion can only be rescued from within. In every society of the bottom billion there are people working for change, but usually they are defeated by the powerful internal forces stacked against them. We should be helping the heroes. So far, our efforts have been paltry: through inertia, ignorance, and incompetence, we have stood by and watched them lose.

Let me be clear: we cannot rescue them. These societies of the bottom billion can only be rescued from within.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Not all developing countries are the same.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Poverty is not intrinsically a trap, otherwise we would all still be poor.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“The key obstacle to reforming aid is public opinion.. Public opinion drives them into the "I care" photo opportunities that dominate aid.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Persuading everyone to behave decently to each other because the society is so fragile is a worthy goal, but it may be more straightforward just to make the societies less fragile, which means developing their economies.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Politicians would only move beyond gestures once there was a critical mass of informed citizens.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“The critical changes in trade policy... are politically difficult not because they threaten interests (they don't) but because they do not fit into any of the current slogans and so don't make it onto the agenda.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Suppose a country starts its independence with the three economic characteristics that globally make a country prone to civil war: low income, slow growth, and dependence upon primary commodity exports. It is playing Russian roulette. That is not just an idle metaphor: the risk that a country in the bottom billion falls into civil war in any five-year period is nearly one in six, the same risk facing a player of Russian roulette.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Pressure works, but it needs to be organized. This is the domain of the NGOs and the rock stars.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries Are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“Es natural que un gobierno de un país en situación de posguerra trate de defenderse, pero no le servirá de nada.”
― Paul Collier, El club de la miseria. Qué falla en los países más pobres del mundo (Armas Y Letras nº 21)

“podemos decir que los “chulos bancarios” son tan despreciables como los proxenetas comunes.”
― Paul Collier, El club de la miseria. Qué falla en los países más pobres del mundo (Armas Y Letras nº 21)

“Entre eso y las amenazas de muerte que recibió, la nueva ministra supo que iba por buen camino. ”
― Paul Collier, El club de la miseria. Qué falla en los países más pobres del mundo (Armas Y Letras nº 21)

“Ni la búsqueda de justicia con ánimo vengativo por parte de los vencedores ni el olvido por decreto son actitudes deseables.”
― Paul Collier, El club de la miseria. Qué falla en los países más pobres del mundo (Armas Y Letras nº 21)

“es imposible que los dos estén en lo cierto. Sí es posible, en cambio, que los dos estén en un error”
― Paul Collier, El club de la miseria. Qué falla en los países más pobres del mundo (Armas Y Letras nº 21)

“La otra opción es quedarnos de brazos cruzados mientras nuestras petroleras compiten con los chinos a ver quién soborna mejor.”
― Paul Collier, El club de la miseria. Qué falla en los países más pobres del mundo (Armas Y Letras nº 21)

“In September 2001, after an unnecessary international war with Ethiopia, half the Eritrean cabinet wrote to the president, Isaias Afwerki, asking him to think again about his autocratic style of government. He thought about it and imprisoned them all.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It

“The left needs to move on from the West’s self-flagellation and idealized notions of developing countries. Poverty is not romantic. The countries of the bottom billion are not there to pioneer experiments in socialism; they need to be helped along the already trodden path of building market economies.”
― Paul Collier, The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can Be Done About It