Jacques Delors Quotations

Cinema explains American society. It's like a Western, with good guys and bad guys, where the weak don't have a place.

Fundamentally, American society is composed of individuals who don't go out of their way to do each other favours.

If you don't have collective agreements between unions and employers, governments have to legislate more.

Any union that can't accept workers choosing their own representatives through universal franchise is finished.

These days there are not enough of such intermediary groups, between the state and the individual, with the result that political leaders are often unduly guided by opinion polls.

I cannot resign myself to the decline of Europe, and of France.

The European model is in danger if we obliterate the principle of personal responsibility.

This desire for equity must not lead to an excess of welfare, where nobody is responsible for anything.

Yes, the European model remains superior to that of America and Japan.

The unions still have a job to do, representing their members' interests to governments and parliaments. And I think collective agreements still have a role, alongside markets and laws.