My favourite thing about Bregman’s new book Moral Ambition is its boldness. These days, we tend to tiptoe around morality — softening our convictions, reassuring others we don’t expect them to follow suit, doing whatever it takes to avoid sounding judgmental…or worse, being judged.
But Bregman turns that on its head. His book is packed with zingers that say to humanity: “What are you doing? Wake up! Act! Do it now!” He opens with a chapter titled “No, you’re not fine just the way you are”, and calls out the “Noble Loser” — someone who’s morally righteous but ultimately ineffective.
And yet, I never felt like he’d gone too far. If anything, his willingness to risk offence or seem extreme was refreshing — the kind of provocation we, as a society, badly need. No, you won’t agree with everything he says. But his zingers still cut really deep, precisely because they don’t shy away from making big, bold claims.
So here are ten of my favourite Moral Ambition quotes, roughly grouped into a few themes that stood out to me. Even if you haven’t read the book, these quotes stand on their own as powerful challenges to how we think about making a difference.
1. “We hold all kinds of viewpoints on all kinds of matters, but we generally do little with our viewpoints.” (Chapter 4, p. 68)
2. “It’s not what you think is right that counts, but what you’re prepared to do about it.”(Chapter 4, p. 69)
3. “There are two forms of ‘knowing.’ You can know something and then do something about it. Or you can know something and look away, afraid to face the consequences of what you know to be true.” (Chapter 2, p. 31)
4. “You can’t be afraid to come across as weird if you want to make a difference. Every milestone of civilization was first seen as the crazy idea of some subculture or another, from the Pythagorean theorem to the conviction that slavery is depraved.” (Chapter 3, p. 49)
5. “The fear of being different runs deep in human nature. We may tell earnest tales of our personal convictions, but what we actually do is mostly a matter of mimicry. The longing to belong is like a magnet, interfering with our inner compass.” (Chapter 2, p. 25)
6. “The only person we can’t use in this fight [to change the world] is the fool who thinks good intentions are enough. Someone whose clear-eyed convictions put them squarely on the right side of history, but who achieves little in the here and now. Let’s call this figure the Noble Loser” - (Chapter 4, p. 65)
7. “Many people are more preoccupied with the kind of work they do than with the impact that work has. As long as it feels good.” (Chapter 1, p. 12)
8. “The trouble with idealists who lack ambition is they tend to prize awareness more than action. Words and intentions take precedence over deeds and consequences, and what something’s really like often gets eclipsed by what it feels like.” (Chapter 1, p. 14)
9. “In some circles, you’d think the highest good is not to have any impact at all. A good life is then primarily defined by what you don’t do. Don’t fly. Don’t eat meat. Don’t have kids…the aim is to have the smallest footprint possible, with your little vegetable garden and your tiny house. Best-case scenario? Your impact on the planet is so negligible, you could just as well not have existed. Don’t get me wrong – it’s a fine idea to align even your smallest deeds with your biggest values. But surely a good life consists of more than what you don’t do? One would hope that on your deathbed, you can chalk up your life’s work to more than simply all the harm you didn’t cause?” (Chapter 1, p. 13)
10. “There are libraries full of books about the question of what distinguishes the doers from the non-doers, the builders from the non-builders, and the heroes from the rest. But what if moral ambition isn’t a personal quality or attribute, but rather a frame of mind? And what if that mindset is contagious– something everyone can catch?” - (Chapter 2, p. 37)
If you’ve caught – or want to catch – the “moral ambition” bug, Bregman offers no shortage of inspiring stories showing that everyday people can step up and be the heroes the world needs right now. He offers you the chance to do it too – through his School for Moral Ambition, where you can commit to “stop wasting your talent and start making a difference.” I’m super excited to see what comes out of it.
In the meantime, I can’t help but editorialize on a few of his core themes – working at Giving What We Can, I naturally viewed them through the lens of effective giving, a topic he discusses in the book as well.
For those who haven’t heard of it, effective giving is an approach to charity where you focus on impact over feelings. Instead of donating to the causes you happen to hear about in the news, you stop and ask: what are the problems in the world where I can make the biggest difference? And which charities are implementing exceptional programs in these areas?
This requires consulting the research and recommendations of charity evaluators who focus on assessing – not just overhead spending, financial metrics, or CEO pay – but what the program actually achieves for its cost (its true impact).
Effective giving is in many ways aligned with all of the themes I picked out above:
On that last point – there’s one framing I disagree with Bregman on. While he views humanity’s inaction as a lack of moral ambition, I might characterise it slightly differently: as a lack of moral empowerment. In other words, I think most people are morally ambitious in that they have a strong desire or determination to help others. But this ambition gets swallowed because it doesn’t seem achievable – the world’s problems are overwhelming and overwhelm usually doesn't lead to taking action, even in ambitious individuals. So perhaps it’s not ambition we lack, but clear, meaningful ways to act on it.
This is actually part of the reason behind the 10% Pledge we promote on our website – a public commitment to donate at least 10% of income to the charities you believe can best use it to improve the lives of others. Such a Pledge offers a clear path to making a huge difference, and it’s remarkably achievable – you don’t have to turn your life upside down, get a brand new career, or (depending on your specific financial circumstances) drastically shift your lifestyle to do it. If you’d take a more meaningful job for a 10% pay cut – you can be confident you can afford the Pledge.
Of course, this isn’t to say your moral ambition should necessarily stop there – I think Bregman's book made some fantastic points about leveraging your talents to solve the world’s problems, and I hope he gets a lot of students at the School for Moral Ambition (tuition completely free, by the way, so go ahead and apply!) But – taking a leaf from Bregman’s boldness – especially at this critical juncture in history, I think you should start exercising your moral ambition right now.
In Chapter 2, Bregman identifies a key trigger for taking action, based on psychological research on what separated resistance heroes during World War II from bystanders. Contrary to what you might think, there were very few distinguishing psychological features. Only one circumstance stuck out: being asked. 96% of those who were asked to take action did.
So here’s me asking you:
Will you join the small but growing (almost 10,000) individuals who have pledged to leverage a portion of their income to make the world a better place? Will you help pave the way for the millions who are scared to be different, and who will only act if this type of more significant giving becomes normal? Take the first step to exercising the moral ambition you know you have. Align your actions with your values, help set a cultural norm, and – rather than “knowing” but looking away – stare down the world’s problems and do something about them.
(A great option to try out the spirit of the Pledge without committing to the full 10%!)