Tony Benn’s five questions for the powerful

The family of Tony Benn, an old-time British Labor Party leader, announced today that he died at the age of 88.  Here is one of his favorite sayings:

If one meets a powerful person—Rupert Murdoch, perhaps, or Joe Stalin or Hitler—one can ask five questions:

1. 

   Tony Benn

   What power do you have?

2. Where did you get it?
3. In whose interests do you exercise it?
4. To whom are you accountable?
5. And how can we get rid of you?

Anyone who cannot answer the last of those questions does not live in a democratic system.

via Making Light.

Tags: Favorite Quotations, Tony Benn