Democracy In America

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In what remains after more than a century the greatest study of American political life, Tocqueville describes American society and accounts for its nature and its conflicts in an historical analysis of the nation's origins among different parties of European settlers. Brilliantly written and vividly illustrated with vignettes and portraits, this is also more than an exploration of one society at one time. Tocqueville's assessment of America is as relevant as it ever was, and his explanation of how democratic societies work can illuminate our own nation now.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Gerald Bevan

<I>The Ancien R&eacute;gime and the Revolution</I> is a comparison of revolutionary France and the despotic rule it toppled. Alexis de Tocqueville (1805&ndash;59) is an objective observer of both periods &ndash; providing a merciless critique of the <I>ancien r&eacute;gime</I>, with its venality, oppression and inequality, yet acknowledging the reforms introduced under Louis XVI, and claiming that the post-Revolution state was in many ways as tyrannical as that of the King; its once lofty and egalitarian ideals corrupted and forgotten. Writing in the 1850s, Tocqueville wished to expose the return to despotism he witnessed in his own time under Napoleon III, by illuminating the grand, but ultimately doomed, call to liberty made by the French people in 1789. His eloquent and instructive study raises questions about liberty, nationalism and justice that remain urgent today.

Ancien Regime and the Revolution

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