Quotes by David Riesman
“The problem for the other-directed person is not the problem of rising in a rigid hierarchy, but the problem of being popular.”— David Riesman
“While the inner-directed person could be governed in his conduct by a gyroscope, the other-directed person is governed by a radar.”— David Riesman
“The sources of direction for the individual are 'inner-directed' in the sense that they are implanted early in life by the elders and directed toward generalized but nonetheless inescapably destined goals.”— David Riesman
“The other-directed person is cosmopolitan. For him, the home is not the zone of the intimate, but a staging area for his forays into the world.”— David Riesman
“The tradition-directed person feels the impact of his culture as a unit, but it is nevertheless a unit which has been filtered by the rigid lens of tradition.”— David Riesman
“The lonely crowd is not a book about the unchanging character of Americans, but about the way it is changing.”— David Riesman
“No one can say with finality that the other-directed person is 'happier' than the inner-directed person.”— David Riesman
“What is feared is not failure, but success. Almost any form of success is feared because it asks for still more success.”— David Riesman
“Autonomy is not the same as freedom... Autonomy is the capacity to choose, whereas freedom is the absence of external constraint.”— David Riesman
“Power in America today is situational; celebrities, wealthy people, politicians, journalists, generals, criminals... gain and lose power.”— David Riesman
“The peer-group becomes the measure of all things; the individual has few defenses against the expectations of the group.”— David Riesman
“The media ask for more and more production, and it gets harder and harder to do. The exhausted producer lives in a state of perpetual anxiety.”— David Riesman