Democracy and political economy: Tocqueville's thoughts on J.-B. Say and T.R. Malthus

This essay examines the intellectual origins of Tocqueville's thoughts on political economy. It argues that Tocqueville believed political economy was crucial to what he called the ‘new science of politics’, and it explores his first forays into the discipline by examining his studies of J.-B. Say and T.R. Malthus. The essay shows how Tocqueville was initially attracted to Say's approach as it provided him with a rigorous analytical framework with which to examine American democracy. Though he incorporated important aspects of Say's work in Democracy in America (1835), he was troubled by elements of it. He was unable to articulate clearly these doubts until he began studying Malthus. What he learned from Malthus caused him to move away from the more formalised approach to political economy advocated by Say and his disciples and move towards an approach advocated by Christian political economists, such as Alban Villeneuve-Bargemont. This shift would have important consequences for the composition of Democracy in America (1840).     

The romance of the Inland Isle: Tocqueville's Democracy in America and the landscape of Providence

Nearly two centuries after its publication, Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America (1990a) remains among the most influential accounts of American political culture. This essay argues that the rhetorical foundation of the Democracy's enduring cultural power is its “imaginative geography” (Said 2000), about which I make two, interrelated claims. The first has to do with the Democracy's identification of the American land with divine Providence. I claim that the providential landscape is the chief means by which Tocqueville contains and organizes the account of the tension between achieved liberty and natural freedom that drives the Democracy. My second focus is on the romantic character of the providential landscape. Cosgrove (2005, p. 302) reflects upon the “tenacity of the island condition on the Western imagination” as frame and vessel of “imagination, desire, hopes and fears.” I argue that the Democracy's “Inland Isle,” as I call it, is a metaphorical island in this sense, and that its theoretical capacity and exhortative power derive from Tocqueville's use of an idiom expressive of a distinctively French tradition of landscape theorizing in which garden metaphor was used to construct meanings of equality and freedom, and voice and identity, in an emerging national, bourgeois order.     

A Bible,an Ax,and a Tablet: Tocqueville's Newspapers and Everyday Political Discourse

The relationship between the free press and democracy is at the core of much modern political theory. With the advent of digital media and the decline of newspapers, there is a need to reexamine this relationship. Tocqueville was an astute observer of the importance of newspapers to democratic life and the drawbacks of the medium. This article examines the central features of Tocqueville's view of newspapers, the issues he saw with the tone of newspapers in Jacksonian America, and the value of newspapers. I argue that this analysis shows the importance of a free press to democratic life but that digital media often lacks the local element that Tocqueville saw as an essential feature of newspapers, and this deficiency is problematic for maintaining democratic liberty.     

Democracy in Justice Kennedy's America: Reading Obergefell with Tocqueville

Justice Anthony Kennedy cites Alexis de Tocqueville in support of the majority opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges. But Kennedy's citation leaves much out of Tocqueville's original text. Looking at what Kennedy erases in his quotation of Tocqueville indicates some of the broader cultural and historic erasures that are present in the Obergefell decision (and in the Supreme Court's latter-day treatment of marriage and the family in general). Standing Obergefell next to Tocqueville yields suggestive possibilities for evaluating the evolution of recent Supreme Court jurisprudence—and recent American political thought, more generally speaking—on questions of marriage and family. Specifically, reading Obergefell with Tocqueville reveals the intellectual and political weakness of the contemporary Supreme Court.     

No Angst and All Play: Postmodernism and the Humanities

Abstract

There is widespread disagreement about Tocqueville's conception of human nature, some going so far as to say that Tocqueville possessed no unified conception of human nature at all. In this paper, I aim to provide the essential principles of Tocqueville's conception of human nature through an examination of the way in which he describes the power of human circumstances, such as physical environment, social state, and religion, to shape human character by extracting the principles underlying these transformations. There is no “natural man” or man “in the state of nature” but instead a set of psychic operations that reveal a picture of human nature in which human freedom, or the ability to initiate action in pursuit of important objects, lies at the heart of human life.     

Perspectives: On Political Science: Annual Index Volume 30, 2001

Abstract

Although Tocqueville called Jefferson “the greatest democrat, who has yet issued from within the American democracy,” a close reading of their works suggests that Tocqueville’s assessment of Jefferson was far more mixed than first appears. In the first section, I take up Jefferson’s understanding of the principles of the Declaration of Independence and offer arguments for why Tocqueville chose not to cite the Declaration in Democracy in America. Using those writings of Jefferson available to Tocqueville in French translation, I show that Tocqueville saw in Jefferson’s own understanding of those principles certain dangerous tendencies of the democratic mind. Yet there is one principle on which both agree: the natural right to political liberty and association. Section two compares their contrasting views of republican constitutionalism, taking into account Jefferson’s evolving views of republicanism as well as Tocqueville’s analysis of both the American constitution and his contributions to the committee that framed the French constitution in 1848. The concluding section analyzes their differing assessments of philosophical materialism and religion in preserving the political liberty both sought.     

Mill and Tocqueville: a friendship bruised

Having first met in 1835, John Stuart Mill and Alexis de Tocqueville began ‘an extremely interesting and mutually laudatory correspondence'; but their splendid friendship did not last. A popular thesis focuses on letters exchanged in 1840 to 1842 that reflect conflicting views on the Eastern Question and argues that Mill initiated the ‘strange interruption’. Given Mill's commitment to the ‘agreement of conviction and feeling on the few cardinal points of human opinion’ as a prerequisite of genuine friendship, such interpretation sounds plausible. However, circumstantial evidence, most notably Mill's willingness to have a frank discussion with Tocqueville on pending issues, contradicts the assertion that Mill was enraged by Tocqueville's 1841 letter. This essay suggests focusing attention on two additional cardinal differences between them—their contrasting views of François Guizot and confrontation vis-à-vis benevolent imperialism. Moreover, personal matters such as Harriet Taylor's dislike of Tocqueville and Mill's departure from the London and Westminster Review are also believed to have largely led to Mill discontinuing correspondence with Tocqueville.     

Die stadt und das reich in der verfassungslehre des marsilius von padua

This essay examines Tocqueville's interest in statistics, and how it informed his analysis of democracy. It explores his early engagement with the discipline and shows how this proved critical to his and Beaumont's 1833 study of the American penitentiary system. It shows that Tocqueville's interest in statistics was long lasting. And it pays particular attention to his links with the British Association for the Advancement of Science, examining his attendance at the statistical section meetings of the BAAS conference in Dublin in 1835. It shows how material presented at this conference appeared in a number of Tocqueville's works. The essay argues against the thesis that Tocqueville resisted the primacy of the social. Rather, it shows that his interest in statistics underscored the importance he attached to the social in his analysis of modern democracy.     

Reply to My Critics

Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men stands as one of the great works of American literature and has been interpreted as offering powerful lessons about the nature and problems of democratic politics. Many of these interpretations attempt to ascertain meaning by looking at the effect of Willie Stark on the other characters. The author argues that a more enriching interpretation of the book can be found by interpreting the text through a Tocquevillian lens, whereby the focus of inquiry is the "king's men," embodied in the character of Jack Burden. This focus reveals that the novel illuminates many of the dangers Alexis de Tocqueville identified as originating in the democratic social state, while also offering important supplements to Tocqueville's proposed solutions to these problems.     

Bibliography of articles and books dealing with seventeenth-century religious thought, 1975–1980

This essay examines Tocqueville's conception of the “social” against the background of debates over the relationship between the social and the political in France from the Revolution to mid-century. It focuses on three groups: those associated with the social philosophy of industrialisme, those concerned with the evils of pauperism from the standpoint of Catholic social reform, and those allied with the new Doctrinaire view of society and politics. It argues that Tocqueville consistently resisted the primacy of the “social” as articulated by these thinkers, even in the seductive form offered by François Guizot, whose influence on Tocqueville is examined in light of recent debates over this issue.     

The “Realism” of Augustine's “Political Realism”: Augustine and Machiavelli

Abstract

Arendt and Tocqueville both celebrate a participatory notion of political freedom, but they have a fundamental disagreement about the role that political education should play in fostering an active citizenry. I contrast Tocqueville's “educative” conception of politics with Arendt's “performative” conception, and I explore an important but little-noted difference between the two theorists: whereas Tocqueville argues that it is the task of statesmen “to educate democracy,” Arendt warns that those who seek to “educate” adults are inappropriately aspiring to be their “guardians.” I argue that although Arendt's warnings about the dangers of intertwining politics and education are at times salutary, Tocqueville is ultimately correct that education must be a key task of democratic leadership, and he is right to suggest that politics can itself be educative in crucial ways.     

In Search of Happiness: Victor Jacquemont's Travel in America

This article examines Victor Jacquemont's reflections on American democracy and society occasioned by his travel in the United States in 1827. A close friend of Stendhal, Jacquemont (1801–32) was one of the most prominent representatives of the new French generation that came of age around 1820. After a presentation of Jacquemont's political and intellectual background, the essay examines his remarks on slavery and the future of the red race, the different forms of religion, domestic manners, associational life, and newspapers in America. Because Jacquemont grasped the impact of equality on individual lives and mores in America, he might be regarded as a forerunner of Tocqueville.     

The State of the Union: Sexuality in American History

Books reviewed in this article: Merril D. Smith (ed.), Sex and Sexuality in Early America Beryl Satter, Each Mind a Kingdom: American Women, Sexual Purity, and the New Thought Movement, 1875–1920 Sharon R. Ullman, Sex Seen: The Emergence of Modern Sexuality in America M. E. Melody and Linda M. Peterson, Teaching America about Sex: Marriage Guides and Sex Manuals from the Late Victorians to Dr Ruth     

Hobbes and Schmitt

Many commentators are unconvinced by Carl Schmitt's interpretation of Hobbes's political theory which, to their minds, remakes Hobbes in Schmitt's own authoritarian image. The argument advanced in this essay comprises three claims about Hobbes and Schmitt and the ways in which they are construed. The first claim is that certain commentators are bewitched by a picture of authority which biases their own claims about Hobbes, perhaps in ways that they may not fully appreciate. The second claim relates to Hobbes's individualism. On Schmitt's account, it was this individualism that opened the barely visible crack in the theoretical justification of the state through which it was worm-eaten by liberalism. This essay argues that Hobbes's individualism is not what Schmitt or his critics take it to be. The individualism that figures in Hobbes's discussions of covenant and conscience, pace Schmitt, is an illusion, albeit one that lies at the very heart of his conception of the state and animates his understanding of the relationship between protection and obedience that sustains it. The essay concludes with some remarks about the wider implications of the argument it advances.     

Book Notes

Books reviewed in this article: Judith Wagner DeCew, In Pursuit of Privacy: Law, Ethics, and the Rise of Technology. Peter DeLeon, Democracy and the Policy Sciences. Herbert Inhaber, Why Energy Conservation Fails. Sheila Jasanoff, Science at the Bar: Law, Science, and Technology in America. Marick F. Masters, Unions at the Crossroads: Strategic Membership, Financial, and Political Perspectives. Susan E. Mayer, What Money Can't Buy: Family Income and Children's Life Chances. Pietro S. Nivola (Ed.), Comparative Disadvantages? Social Regulations and the Global Economy. Sudhir Chella Rajan, The Enigma of Automobility:Democratic Politics and Pollution Control. Paul M. Sniderman and Edward G. Carmines, Reaching Beyond Race. Elliott White (Ed.), Intelligence, Political Inequality, and Public Policy. Robet H. Wilson (Ed.), Public Policy and Community: Activism and Governance in Texas.     

Reviews

Book reviewed in this article: K. A. Kitchen : Ancient Orient and Old Testament Fazlur Rahman : Islam. ‘History of Religion’series E. Garth Moore : An Introduction to English Canon Law G. H. W. Parker : The Morning Star. Wycliffe and the Dawn of the Reformation Peter Gay : A Loss of Mastery: Puritan Historians in Colonial America Owen Chadwick : The Victorian Church, Part 1     

BOOK REVIEWS

Book Reviews in this Article: An Index to English Periodical Literature on the Old Testament and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, William G. Hupper (ed.). Chibnall Marjorie : The Empress Matilda: Queen Consort, Queen Mother and Lady of the English. Ann Eljenholm Nichols : Seeable Signs: The Iconography of the Seven Sacraments, 1350-1544. Eamon Duffy : The Stripping of the Altars; Traditional Religion in England, c. 1400- c. 1580. Patrick Collinson : Elizabethan Essays Michael A. R. Graves : Thomas Norton: The Parliament Man. Linda Timmermans : L'accès des femmes à la culture, 1598-1698 Gales of Change: Responding to a Shifting Missionary Context, Bernard Thorogood. (ed.). Curtis D. Johnson : Redeeming America: Evangelicals and the Road to Civil War. Mark Y. Hanley : Beyond a Christian Commonwealth: The Protestant Quarrel with the American Republic, 1830-1860. Religious Transformations and Socio-Political Change: Eastern Europe and Latin America, Luther Martin (ed.). Re-Visioning Australian Colonial Christianity: New Essays in the Australian Experience, 1788-1900, Mark Hutchinson and Edmund Campion (eds). Reviving Australia: Essays on the History and Experience of Revival and Revivalism in Australian Christianity, Mark Hutchinson, Edmund Campion and Stuart Piggin (eds). Walter Phillips : James Jefferis: Prophet of Federation. Allan K. Davidson : Selwyn's Legacy: The College of St John the Evangelist, Te Waimate and Auckland, 1843-1992: A History.     

Book Reviews

Book reviewed in this article Editorial Office : Elliott Hall, Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware , OH 43015 Telephone : 740–368–3642 Fax : 740–368‐3643 E‐mail BRHISTOR@cc.owu.edu From Bondage to Contract: Wage Labor, Marriage, and the Market in the Age of Slave Emancipation. By Amy Dru Stanley. Civil Society in Yemen: The Political Economy of Activism in Modern Arabia. By Sheila Carapico. Disease and Empire: The Health of European Troops in The Conquest of Africa. By Philip D. Curtin. Gendered Justice in the American West: Women Prisoners in Men's Penitentiaries. By Anne M. Butler. Crafting a Class: College Admissions arid Financial Aid, 1955–1994. By Elizabeth A. Duffy and Idana Goldberg. Women, Feminism, and Social Change in Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay, 1890–1940. By Asunción Lavrin. Secrecy: The American Experience. By Daniel Patrick Moynihan, with an introduction by Richard Gid Powers. Narratives and Spaces: Technology and the Construction of American Culture. By David E. Nye, The Power of God Against the Guns of Government: Religious Upheaval in Mexico at the Turn of the Nineteenth Century. By Paul Vanderwood. Women Plantation Workers: International Experiences. Edited by Shobhita Jain and Rhoda Reddock. The Ashio Riot of 1907: A Social History of Mining in Japan. By Kazuo Nimura. Edited by Andrew Gordon. Translated by Terry Boardman and Andrew Gordon. “Strong of Body, Brave and Noble”: Chivalry and Society in Medieval France. By Constance Brittain Bouchard. The Cathars and the Albigensian Crusade. By Michael Costen. Germans on Welfare: From Weimar to Hitler. By David Crew. Germans into Nazis. By Peter Fritsche. Augustan Culture: An Interpretative Introduction. By Karl Galinsky. The British Monarchy and the French Revolution. By Marilyn Morris. King James VI and I and the Reunion of Christendom. By W. B. Patterson. Unwilling Germans? The Goldhagen Debate. Edited, with an introduction, by Robert R. Shandley, and with essays translated by Jeremiah Riemer. Shaping History: Ordinary People in European Politics 1500–1700. By Wayne Te Brake. Merchant Moscow: Images of Russia's Vanished Bourgeoisie. Edited by James L. West and Iurii A. Petrov. With the collaboration of Edith W. Clowes and Thomas C. Owen. Prince Leopold: The Untold Story of Queen Victoria's Youngest Son. By Charlotte Zeepvat. Elections Before Democracy: The History of Elections in Europe and Latin America. Edited by Eduardo Posada Carbó. Thinking With History: Explorations in the Passage to Modernism. By Carl E. Schorske. Men and Violence: Gender, Honor, and Rituals in Modern Europe and America. Edited by Pieter Spierenburg. Durable Inequality. By Charles Tilly.     

Spiritedness,Reason, and the Founding of Law and Order: John Ford's The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance

Abstract

John Ford's 1962 classic Western, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, analyzes the difficulties inherent in founding a new political order based on the rule of law. Some critics have concluded that the film mordantly portrays the closing of the frontier, the tragic loss of the rugged individualism it promoted (represented by Tom Doniphon), and the ascendance in its place of a fraudulent political class (represented by Ransom Stoddard), while exposing that even free societies are founded on crime. Yet, as others have argued, Doniphon also represents the spirited part of the Platonic tripartite soul, revealing spiritedness's ambiguous relation to justice: he refuses to fight unless personally threatened; perpetuates servitude, if not slavery; and shows no interest in promoting equality of women. Doniphon stands in opposition to the principles of the Declaration of Independence, pointedly recited at the film's chronological center, and his eclipse by Stoddard is not a tragic mistake. In addition, John Locke's state of nature teaching unlocks why Valance's death is not a crime that sullies the foundations of the society. Finally, the legend told as fact at the film's conclusion combines both men into a single entity, “the man who shot Liberty Valance,” thereby propagating a salutary lesson for future citizens: reason must combine with and rule over spiritedness if law and order are to prevail.     

Political History and Political Philosophy: Making Sense of the West

Abstract

The old Western synthesis, the coming together of self-government, the Christian proposition, modern equality, and the commitment to relieving man's estate, appears to be unraveling. In the European context, it is being replaced by a “pure democracy” that cannot do justice to the continuity of Western civilization. Rejecting the twin temptations of Progress and Decline, Pierre Manent recovers the perspective of the human agent. While the polis or classical city is no longer available to us, the self-government of free human beings remains at the heart of the Western enterprise. Manent shows that the Christian notion of conscience preserved the classical analogy between the soul and the political association and is at the hear of Western liberty. The West as a whole rests on the synthetic and mediating notion of conscience.