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If we don't change, our species will not survive... Frankly, we may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrial civilization to collapse.

— Maurice Strong

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More quotes by Maurice Strong

It is simply not feasible for sovereignty to be exercised unilaterally by individual nation-states, however powerful. It is a principle which will yield only slowly and reluctantly to the imperatives of global environmental cooperation.

"Our concepts of ballot-box democracy may need to be modified to produce strong governments capable of making difficult decisions."

In 2009, he summarized his approach as, “never to confront, but to co-opt, never to bully but to equivocate, and never to yield”.

Current lifestyles and consumption patterns of the affluent middle class - involving high meat intake, the use of fossil fuels, electrical appliances, home and work-place air-conditioning, and suburban housing - are not sustainable.

“We are victims of ‘the struggle between ecosystems and egosystems’. It is the egos of people, governments, businesses that prevent solutions and generate a terrible lack of political will.” (2005)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Maurice Strong (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.