Freedom Quotes

“What does freedom mean to me? This question has occupied me my entire life. Naturally, politically, because freedom needs democratic conditions, without democracy there is no freedom, no rule of law, no protection of human rights. But this question also occupies me on another level. Freedom, for me, is finding out where my own limits are, and pushing my own limits. Freedom is for me not to stop learning, not to have to stand still but to be allowed to continue, even after leaving politics.” - Angela Merkel”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954-2021

“But there is another feeling that has lingered as well. I don't know exactly what to call it, and I'm searching for the right word. Perhaps this is it: superiority. Superiority in relation to the state's efforts at discipline and intimidation. This was a state that never trusted its citizens, or, most importantly, itself -- and as a result it was as petty, narrow-minded, tasteless, and -- yes, that too -- humorless as it could possibly be.

...despite it all, this state didn't manage to take from me something that allowed me to live, to sense, to feel: a degree of light-heartedness. It had been with me since I was a little girl. And the fact that the GDR couldn't take it from me is what I feel to be my greatest personal victory over the system. Without this light-heartedness -- and in retrospect I am convinced of this -- I never would have guilelessly done my homework during that ML lecture.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954-2021

“I must say quite honestly: if we now have to start apologizing for showing a friendly face in emergency situations, then this is not my country.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“Even now, I cannot understand how anyone could assume that a friendly face on a photo could encourage people to flee their homeland in droves.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“natural gas,”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 - 2021

“«El problema no es lo imaginable, sino sobre todo lo inimaginable».”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“De mis conversaciones saqué la siguiente conclusión: con Trump no habría cooperación para un mundo interconectado. Él consideraba todo desde la perspectiva de un inversor inmobiliario, lo que había sido antes de meterse en política. Cada propiedad solo podía adjudicársela una vez, y si no la conseguía él, la conseguía otro. Así es como Trump veía el mundo: todos los países participaban en una carrera en la que el logro de uno significaba el fracaso de otro, no creía que la cooperación pudiera incrementar el bienestar común.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“Y es que la libertad de culto es parte esencial de toda democracia.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“Dejé claro que en el transcurso del siglo XXI sería necesaria una descarbonización considerable de nuestras economías.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“la tolerancia: hemos de poder ver también con los ojos del otro. Eso exige conocer y querer entender a ese otro.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“La libertad es el requisito para nuestra diversidad, en concreto, la libertad en todas sus formas.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“Nada me angustiaba más que no ser capaz de formular una pregunta razonable por saber muy poco sobre una nación.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“¿Qué impacto tiene nuestra manera de vivir en las personas que proceden del mundo árabe, que llegan desde países musulmanes? ¿Qué impacto tienen en nosotros sus características culturales?”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“ninguna acción consecuente contra los traficantes de migrantes en el mar, ningún control ni registro intensivo en nuestras fronteras interiores, ninguna valla alta ni larga habría podido, como algunos querían hacernos creer, reducir de manera permanente y sostenible el número de personas que cruzaban”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“Una cosa es predicar y otra dar trigo.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“combatir al otro lado de las fronteras de la UE las causas de la huida.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“de que nadie abandona su hogar a la ligera, tampoco quienes lo hacen por carecer de perspectivas económicas y sociales, y que no tienen posibilidad de ser reconocidos como solicitantes de asilo político”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“la democracia se mantiene viva con la alternancia.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“Tanto es así que el resultado fue insuperable en cuanto a mezquindad, estrechez de miras, mal gusto y —sí, eso también— falta de humor.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“La política no es cosa de brujería. La política la hacen las personas, con sus inclinaciones, experiencias, vanidades, debilidades, fortalezas, deseos, sueños, convicciones, valores e intereses. Personas que si quieren llevar a cabo algo, en una democracia deben luchar por una mayoría.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“Treuhandgesetz—the Trust Law (officially: Law on the Privatization and Reorganization of the Assets of the People).”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“on October 3, 1990, the country was reunited.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“Two Plus Four Agreement”—a treaty between the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic on one side, and France, the Soviet Union, the UK, and the USA on the other.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“It was hard for me to understand why the majority of expropriation cases should be analyzed in detail and judged in favor of the former owners, when virtually no one showed any willingness to compensate the East German citizens—dissidents, the victims of SED crimes, and many pastors’ children, for example—for the lifelong disadvantages they had suffered.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“chancellor’s often-discussed authority to decide policy: following one’s own moral compass in certain situations and genuinely assuming ultimate political responsibility.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“raised to mark German unity. From Schöneberg in West Berlin, the peal of the Freedom Bell was broadcast in the square in front of the Reichstag. A replica of the famous Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, financed in large part by donations from Americans, this bell had hung in Schöneberg’s town hall since October 1950. To this day, it bears the inscription “That this world under God shall have a new birth of freedom,” echoing President Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address in 1863, at the turning point in the American Civil War. The inscription had become reality for us, too. The GDR was history. There was only one German state now.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“Cuando iba a ver partidos a los estadios, en ocasiones, desde el mismo instante en que un equipo accedía al terreno de juego podía saber por su lenguaje corporal si iba a tener un buen día o no. Era algo que conocía por mi trabajo, cuando entraba en una sala como ponente, ya en los primeros instantes podía percibir si podía conectar con el público o, por el contrario, si entre nosotros se interponía un muro.”
― Angela Merkel, Libertad: Memorias (1954 – 2021)

“I didn’t see the Chernobyl reactor accident as a systemic failure of nuclear power, but as simply a result of Soviet sloppiness.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“The desire for freedom and independence from the socialist system was much more evident in Poland than it was at home.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021

“They’ve lost the justification for their existence.”
― Angela Merkel, Freedom: Memoirs 1954 – 2021