I found that Scottishness and Englishness are actually strong, instinctive things, whatever the historical reasons. Even the accent changes – just two inches across the border. Rory Stewart Read Quote
When you’re doing mountain rescue, you don’t take a doctorate in mountain rescue; you look for somebody who knows the terrain. It’s about context. Rory Stewart Read Quote
If things are going wrong in a country, it’s not usually that we don’t have enough foreigners. It’s usually that we have too many. Rory Stewart Read Quote
Democracy matters because it reflects an idea of equality and an idea of liberty. It reflects an idea of dignity, the dignity of the individual, the idea that each individual should have an equal vote, an equal say, in the formation of their government. Rory Stewart Read Quote
September 11th has produced only miniature heroes because our culture has freed itself from many of the old, dangerous, elitist fantasies of heroism… But in so doing, we have not only tamed and diminished heroes. We have risked taming and diminishing ourselves. Rory Stewart Read Quote
Nostalgia for dead tyrants and the longing for heroes are unhealthy, and they can result in the deification of a Saddam as easily as a Havel or Mandela. Rory Stewart Read Quote
I have a constituency with 52,000 people and a million sheep. I was in one village where a local kid was run over by a tractor. They took him to Carlisle, but they couldn’t be bothered to wait at the hospital. So they put him in a darkened room for two weeks, then said he was fine. But I’m not so sure he was. Rory Stewart Read Quote
The world isn’t one way or another. Things can be changed very, very rapidly by someone with sufficient confidence, sufficient knowledge and sufficient authority. Rory Stewart Read Quote
For politicians to be honest, the public needs to allow them to be honest, and the media, which mediates between the politicians and the public, needs to allow those politicians to be honest. If local democracy is to flourish, it is about the active and informed engagement of every citizen. Rory Stewart Read Quote
I have not met, in Afghanistan, in even the most remote community, anybody who does not want a say in who governs them. Most remote community, I have never met a villager who does not want a vote. Rory Stewart Read Quote
