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George Soros: Reality is extremely complex, infinitely complex. We all face life with an imperfect understanding.
Anybody who claims perfect knowledge is basically mistaken. Communism and Nazism were ideologies of this kind.
Endre Bojtar: It's a closed system: government-controlled, government-sponsored, government-edited. It just leads to nasty regimes.
It always goes back to one thing, that someone wants unchecked power.
George Soros: All our social institutions are imperfect and ought to hold themselves open to improvement.
And that is the ideal of an open society.
Leon Botstein: Mr. Soros is motivated by a sense of the possibility of human beings.
Sherrilyn Ifill: How do we live together in a society in which I absolutely disagree with you and you absolutely disagree with me?
That's actually the challenge.
Ed Rekosh: The best system of governance is to allow for pluralism, allow for all of those voices to be heard, but also to allow for change. We may be wrong.
George Soros: A world with imperfect understanding is a much more difficult world to deal with.
Chris Stone: We try to understand who is vulnerable, who is marginalized, who is oppressed, society by society, place by place.
Sherrilyn Ifill: We're willing to focus on the aspects of the issues that people may shy away from. And that shows a kind of fearlessness.
Cecile Richards: The Open Society Foundations have fundamentally changed life in this country for millions of people and certainly around the globe.
Chris Stone: We have independent foundations in many parts of the world, and they pursue their own visions in their countries.
And there's no other philanthropic enterprise structured in that way.
Ivan Krastev: Soros himself, and the Soros foundation was a dividing line, a front line in Central and Eastern Europe in the post Cold War environment.
Wiktor Osiatynski: Human rights was a pretty important issue for us under Communism because we didn't have these rights.
Endre Bojtar: He financed a huge variety of programs like the Central European University. It linked people together. From the West, from the East.
Leon Botstein: He has from the start given scholarships to young people to widen their horizons.
Aryeh Neier: We provided scholarships over the years to thousands of Burmese.
George Soros: After twenty years of investment, the situation was just going from bad to worse.
Maureen Aung-Thwin: But when Burma opened up and he went there, he said it's good to fund a lost cause for a long time.
Judge Najla Ayubi: I am one of the products of the Open Society Foundations scholarships.
And I started being part of the state-building, the constitution-making process. Taking the values of the Open Society Foundations to Afghanistan.
Yuen Ying Chan: Journalism is one critical element for an open society.
We published books sponsored by the Foundation.
Firoze Manji: The aim is to provide a platform for voices which are not normally heard.
In Tunisia, in Egypt, 25, 30 different countries within the African continent.
Citizens are now beginning to say, well hang on a moment, this is our government, this is our country.
Ken Roth: Every government is tempted to violate human rights and there is a need for institutions to keep them in check.
Jameel Jaffer: What was going on at Guantanamo was unacceptable, and it's good to have supporters who understand that however controversial the issues are
they're of such significance for our democracy that they need to be addressed and they need to be addressed now.
Chris Stone: We have an in-house public-interest law firm who are litigating around the world on behalf of the Roma, on behalf of the people of Equatorial Guinea,
on behalf of the Nubians in Nairobi, Kenya--many groups for whom no one else is defending rights.
Shawn Dove: Black men and boys in America
Hina Jilani: Vulnerable communities in Pakistan
Judith Browne-Dianis: Survivors of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans
Gita Sen: Dalits in India
Kumar Bekbolotov: Schoolchildren in Kyrgyzstan
Nazia Hussain: Muslims across western European cities
Firoze Manji: LGBTI groups across East Africa
Leon Botstein: Dissidents
Vince Warren: Torture victims
Sian Maseko: Sex workers
Allan Clear: All those people that have died of *** because we refuse to give them syringes.
Amrit Singh: To give voice to people who may not have that voice, who may have been deprived of it.
Violeta Naydenova: We empower them so they know how to be their own advocates.
Gita Sen: George's own background and history made him very aware to make sure that one does not rule anybody out by just saying too difficult, impossible, can't do anything.
Mark Malloch Brown: Behind it all is this deep, profound sense of humanity.
It just puts the value of every human being on such an important, unique plane.
George Soros: We are trying to make the world a better place, but that is not necessarily what we accomplish.
Many of the problems that preoccupy us are basically insoluble.
István Rév: This is what I learned from him.
That even if there is no hope, you have no other choice but to fight, and to get engaged.
Kumar Bekbolotov: What is just? What is it that people should stand up for?
What is it that people should defend?
Jameel Jaffer: People have rights by virtue of being human,
not by virtue of being citizens of a particular country, not by virtue of their ethnicity.
Endre Bojtar: Freedom of thought
Yuen Ying Chan: Free exchange of ideas
Nader Nadery: A free media, an open media
Nazia Hussain: A sense of critical thinking
Jameel Jaffer: Accountability
Kumar Bekbolotov: Good governance
Anton Artemyev: Every person has a right to live with dignity.
Amrit Singh: A conception of society that is pluralistic, that is open.
It is our hope that those ideals will get perpetuated across the world.