Clay Shirky Quotes

“[B]ecause the minimum costs of being an organization in the first place are relatively high, certain activities may have some value but not enough to make them worth pursuing in any organized way. New social tools are altering this equation by lowering the costs of coordinating group action.”

“Organic farming appealed to me because it involved searching for and discovering nature's pathways, as opposed to the formulaic approach of chemical farming. The appeal of organic farming is boundless; this mountain has no top, this river has no end.”

“As you try to balance between the socialist and capitalist systems in the world, you will come up against the biggest problem facing humanity today. Jung wrote in 1938 "Any large company composed of wholly admirable persons has the morality and intelligence of an unwieldy, stupid, and violent animal. The bigger the organization, the more unavoidable is its immorality and blind stupidity." Each of these systems promotes itself by pointing out the moral failings of the other, but these moral failings are actually failings brought about by people acting within the context of large organizations. What is truly needed is to learn a structure of organization of human beings that provides for the organized group the same capacity and propensity for moral behavior that is possessed by individuals.”

“Large organization is loose organization. Nay it would be almost as true to say that organization is always disorganization.”

“Organization isn't about perfection; it's about efficiency, reducing stress and clutter, saving time and money and improving your overall quality of life.”

“Organized labor is organized to take control of an asset away from its rightful owners without paying for it. Organized labor is organization of property by those who don't own it. Organized labor, by driving up the costs of production through coercive means, destroys industries. Organized labor is piracy without the boats and eye patches. Why would anybody want to celebrate organized labor?”

“Until now, human organization could only be based upon something negative which could not be conquered: SCARCITY, and something false: PERSONAL ACCOUNTABILITY... No wonder instead of producing stability, it produced the exact opposite.The current human organization based upon dealing with the consequences of scarcity and being considered responsible for our individual characteristics which we could never have chosen (our nature, our nurture, our “soul”, and all the choices they engender), will always lead to an irrational, hence unstable human organization causing perpetual conflicts, which is no organization at all.Today, we have the luxury to initiate a rational self-organization based upon two positives: -our HUMAN CONSENSUS; our common desires shared by all, and -the SCIENTIFIC PROJECT to achieve them.”

“The quality of conversation appears to be a key factor in the evolution of an organization.”

“I've never joined any organization - not even the ones I've organized myself. I prize my own independence too much.”

“Interest in such organizations is too often linked to the fringe and marginal or thought to be little more than conspiracy theories. While such a critique is not entirely incorrect, we will see that hidden organizations are far more common, more important, and more consequential than we have typically allowed ourselves to admit. As a result, they also need to be better integrated into thinking about organizations by scholars, policymakers, and everyday citizens.”