Democracy in america by alexis de tocqueville sparknotes

This enduring classic explores the civil institutions and. Although franceand europe in generalhave long been home to aristocratic monarchies where a king and queen rule but an aristocratic class also retains power and privileges based on birth, equality of condition a leveling out of social class hierarchies is increasingly. Find summaries for every chapter, including a democracy in america chapter summary chart. Created by the original team behind sparknotes, litcharts are the worlds best literature guides. What struck him most was the countrys equality of conditions, its democracy. Democracy in america has had the singular honor of being even to this day the work that political commentators of every stripe refer to when they seek to draw large conclusions about the society of the united states. Its title translates as on democracy in america, but english translations are usually simply entitled democracy in america. Supersummary, a modern alternative to sparknotes and cliffsnotes, offers highquality study guides for challenging works of literature. He is best known for his works democracy in america appearing in two volumes, 1835 and 1840 and the old regime and the revolution. After extensive travels across the young nation, tocqueville wrote democracy in america published in two volumes in 1835 and 1840. Tocqueville embarked on his own political career in france but is best known for his contributions to history and political philosophy. He wrote democracy in america after visiting the united states during which he observed various elements of the prison system. Learn exactly what happened in this chapter, scene, or section of structural transformation of the public sphere and what it means.

Its title translates as on democracy in america, but english translations are. Tocqueville is a 2010 book of poetry by libyanamerican author and professor khaled mattawa. The author documents his travels through america and contrasts his experiences with established aristocratic systems in western europe. Having seen the failed attempts at a democratic government in his native france, tocqueville set out to study a stable and prosperous democracy in order to gain insight into how it work. Democracy in america chapter summaries course hero.

After barely escaping the guillotine, his parents escaped to england. Furthermore, tocquevilles democracy in america is often cited by presentday critics because so many of the observations in it seem extraordinarily suitable even more than one hundred and fifty years later. During his trip to the united states, tocqueville was able to describe the awakening democracy. The surprisingly large number of readers who chuckled over toby youngs how to lose friends. Although franceand europe in generalhave long been home to aristocratic monarchies where a king and queen rule but an aristocratic class also retains power and privileges based on birth, equality of condition a leveling out. Tocqueville is best known for democracy in america, which was published in two volumes in 1835 and 1840. Furthermore, tocqueville s democracy in america is often cited by presentday critics because so many of the observations in it seem extraordinarily suitable even more than one hundred and fifty years later. Tocqueville pinpoints a few major events that have led to equality of condition, from the crusades, which devastated the nobles wealth, to the art of printing, which disseminated knowledge among many, and protestantism, which proclaimed the ability of all to reach heaven on their own merits. Tocqueville argues that one must study social conditions in order to understand the laws and ideas that regulate a nation.

Inheritance laws were, in france and elsewhere, crucial means of transmitting wealth and maintaining an aristocracy over time. One way in which he stood out in nineteenthcentury france was his attitude towards religion. An overview of the book democracy in america thoughtco. Equality reigned from the start in new england, although to the south some english proprietors had imported aristocratic principles of inheritance, buttressed by slavery. The same revolution is taking place throughout the christian world, and democracy is. His ninemonth sojourn led to the writing of democracy in america, universally regarded as one of the most influential books ever written. In the following excerpt from the book, tocqueville discusses the effectiveness of americas democracy. He describes americas social condition as, in a word, democratic. Such laws supported practices like primogeniture, in which only the eldest son would receive the fortune and property, as well as the prevention of partitioning an estate, whichas tocqueville notes herewould eventually cause the most powerful families fortunes. The book he wrote on his return to france, democracy in america, is both the best ever written on democracy and the best ever written on america.

Although franceand europe in generalhave long been home to aristocratic monarchies where a king and queen rule but an aristocratic class also retains power and privileges based on birth, equality of condition a leveling out of social class hierarchies is increasingly coming to replace such customs. Find a summary of this and each chapter of democracy in america. While historians have viewed democracy as a rich source about the age of andrew jackson, tocqueville was more of a political thinker than a historian. His approach is totally original compar to a normative philosophy that prevailed in classics montesquieu, rousseau and the greeks, tocqueville rather use a descriptive and clinical approach. In the book, the french author analyzes the political and sociological aspects of the american democratic regime and contrasts his findings with the situation of the people living under the aristocratic. Idea and ideology in jurgen habermass structural transformation of the public sphere. Democracy in america as democracy in america revealed, tocqueville believed that equality was the great political and social idea of his era, and he thought that the.