Elton Mayo - Political Quotes

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The recent growth of interest in political matters in Australia is by no means a sign of social health.

Elton Mayo
So long as commerce specializes in business methods which take no account of human nature and social motives, so long may we expect strikes and sabotage to be the ordinary accompaniment of industry. Sabotage is essentially a protest of the human spirit against dull mechanism. And the emphasis which democracy places upon political methods tends to transform mere sporadic acts of sabotage into an organized conspiracy against society.

Elton Mayo
Revolution or civil war is the only outcome of the present irreconcilable attitude of Australian political parties. The methods of "democracy," far from providing a means of solving the industrial problem, have proved entirely inadequate to the task. Political organization has been mistaken for political education; the party system has accentuated and added to our industrial difficulties. Democracy has done nothing to help society to unanimity, nothing to aid the individual to a sense of social function.

Elton Mayo
In the nineteenth century there was an iU-founded hope that some species of political remedy for industrial ills might be discovered; this hope has passed. There have been very considerable political changes, both generally and also in particular national systems, since the end of the war in 1918. But the human problems of industrial organization remain identical for Moscow, London, Rome, Paris, and New York. As ever in human affairs, we are struggling against our own ignorance and not against the machinations of a political adversary.

Elton Mayo