Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville
"Democracy in America" by Alexis de Tocqueville is a seminal work that examines the political and social structures of the United States during the early 19th century. Written by a French aristocrat who traveled extensively through America, the work provides insights into the development of democracy and equality in a new nation. Tocqueville's analysis begins with a description of American geography, society, and economy, highlighting the role of property distribution in fostering a more egalitarian culture compared to European norms.
A significant theme in the text is the nature of political equality, particularly evident in local governance and civic engagement, which Tocqueville argues is crucial for training citizens in the principles of democracy. He expresses admiration for the fluidity of wealth and opportunity in America, contrasting it with the rigid class structures of Europe. However, Tocqueville also addresses potential pitfalls of democracy, warning of the "tyranny of the majority" that can undermine minority rights and lead to despotism.
In addition to political analysis, the work explores American cultural tendencies, discussing the challenges faced by the arts and the preference for practical achievements over aesthetic ones. Ultimately, Tocqueville's insights remain relevant as he emphasizes the importance of balancing individual freedoms with collective responsibilities within a democratic society. His reflections on democracy serve not only as a commentary on the United States but also as a cautionary tale for other nations navigating similar political landscapes.
Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville
First published:De la démocratie en Amérique: volume 1, 1835; volume 2, 1840 (English translation, 1835/1840)
Type of work: Politics
The Work
Alexis de Tocqueville lived in a time of enormous political change, when every conceivable variety of political theory flourished. He was born shortly after the French Revolution had turned France into the empire. In his lifetime occurred those further changes that transformed France, at least nominally, into a republic. His object in writing Democracy in America was twofold: to write about the new nation that he so much admired and to establish a new way of examining ideas of politics. Instead of proceeding from ideas of right and responsibility, Tocqueville preferred to begin by analyzing social institutions as they functioned in reality. Instead of working, as Jean-Jacques Rousseau had worked, from an arbitrary picture of the beginnings of humanity in a natural condition, Tocqueville preferred to work from what was statistically observable. Thus, Democracy in America begins with a picture of the geography of the new continent, its weather, its indigenous tribes, its economy, and its natural resources. In this respect, Democracy in America is the forerunner of the scientific spirit in the investigation of social structures.
Much of Democracy in America is concerned with institutions, and the first institution described by Tocqueville is that of the partition of property. He points out that it is customary in the nations of Europe to divide property by the laws of primogeniture. The result is that property remains fixed in extent and in possession; the family, no matter how changed in each generation, is linked to the wealth and political power of landed property. The family represents the estate, the estate the family, and naturally a strong inequality is carried from one generation to another. The foundations of American culture are to be found, Tocqueville points out, in the equal partition of land and fortune. Land is continually broken up into parcels, sold, developed, and transformed. The accompanying wealth and power are much more fluid than in societies in which descent really dominates fortune. The subsidiary effect of equal partition is that people have access to careers from which they might be blocked in another system.
Tocqueville was fascinated by the practice of equality, a phenomenon rarely encountered in France during his lifetime. Several chapters concern political equality; he is one of the first great commentators on the democracy of US townships and corporations in the early nineteenth century. He emphasizes that it is fundamental to understand the nature of the township, particularly in its New England tradition. The key to the nature of the United States, he asserts, is the wide and responsible nature of freedom at the level of municipal government. This gives the citizen a direct voice in the government and trains the citizen for the representative democracy of the federal government. Tocqueville points out that, under this form of government, power is concentrated in the hands of the voter; the legislative and executive branches have no power of their own, but merely represent those who appoint them. To us, this fact is commonplace, but it was a new idea for the citizens of Europe in the nineteenth century.
Although much of this work is in praise of democracy in the United States, Tocqueville makes some important qualifications. His first principle is that abuse in government occurs when one special interest is served to the exclusion of all others. This kind of abuse, he remarks, formerly occurred when the upper classes imposed their will on the lower, or when military, feudal, financial, or even religious values operated to the exclusion of all others. His great qualification of democracy is that it makes possible a tyranny of the majority. He states that it is conceivable that the free institutions of the United States may be destroyed by forcing all minorities to give up their freedoms for what is supposedly the good of the majority. In that case, he concludes, democracy will give way first to despotism and then to anarchy. Above all things, Tocqueville is taken with equality, and that principle, regardless of the greatest good for the greatest number, is what animates his opinion.
Democracy in America is principally about its great subject, but there are in it many reminders of a larger view that its author has. One constant theme of the book is that the Old World must learn from the New World; in fact, the book functions not so much as an independent study of a unique phenomenon as a study of comparative political science. The French will not succeed, the author remarks, if they do not introduce democratic institutions. There will be independence for none, he adds, unless, like the republic of the United States, the French grant independence for all. With uncommon prescience, he predicts the totalitarian potentialities of the twentieth century, in which unlimited power restricted itself not to a class, but first to a party, and then to a single man. The famous ending of the first volume carries this insight to a more elaborate and specific culmination. There are two nations, Tocqueville asserts, that probably will dominate the next century: Russia and the United States. One, he says, is driven by the desire for power and war, the other by the desire to increase domestic prosperity. He predicts that there will be no peace until the aggressiveness of Russia is checked by the peacefulness of the United States: He looks to a future in which the principle of servitude will encounter that of freedom.
The second volume of Democracy in America was published five years after the first. The first volume had established its author as one of the best political thinkers in Europe. It won for him not only the esteem of the best minds of Europe but also financial and political rewards, so that from the time of its publication Tocqueville was to take an active part as a member of the French government. The second volume is concerned not with the basic economic and social characteristics of the United States but with subsidiary questions about the nature of American culture. Tocqueville asks, for example, how Americans cultivate the arts and whether or not eloquence is to be encountered in the rhetoric of Congress. He covers the progress of science as well as that of poetry, the position of religious minorities, even the meaning of public monuments in a democracy. His general conclusion on the arts in the United States is that they do not flourish as they do in other political climates, for the arts require an atmosphere of privilege and an amount of money that a tax-conscious public is quite unlikely to spend. The useful, he says, is much preferred in a democracy to the beautiful. The artist becomes an artisan and, the author remarks with some delicacy, tends to produce imperfect commodities rather than lasting works of art.
If these qualifications are admitted, they are also weighted. Tocqueville believes that a lowering of some standards is amply compensated by a heightening of others. Particularly in the matter of foreign policy, he admires the republican sense as well as form of government. Toward the end of Democracy in America, he ruminates on the inclinations toward war and peace of different forms of government. The democratic form, he judges, is predisposed to peace because of various influences: the rapid growth of personal wealth; the stake in property; the less material but equally important gentleness of heart that allows the citizens of a democracy a more humane view of life. Yet, when the democratic government is involved in war, the same application of ambition and energy that is so marked in commercial life results often in military success as well. Tocqueville’s last thoughts about the democracy and its army deal with the danger to any society from its own standing army, and he covers substantially the same ground on this matter as do the authors of the Federalist Papers.
Democracy in America ends with the restatement that despotism may be encountered even in republics. The author admits that democracies can, on occasion, be violent and unjust, but he believes these occasions are exceptional. They will be more and more frequent, however, in the proportion that equality is allowed to lapse. Among the last of Tocqueville’s animated descriptions is that of the “flock of timid and industrious animals” who have given up their individuality to a strong central government. He urges a balance between central and decentralized power, the constant consciousness of equality for all members of the polity.
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