Download or read book Nature and History in American Political Development written by James W. Ceaser and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2006-03-31 with total page 252 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this inaugural volume of the Alexis de Tocqueville Lectures, Ceaser traces how certain “foundational” ideas—including nature, history, and religion—have been understood and used over the course of American history. Three commentators challenge his arguments, and a spirited debate about large and enduring questions in American politics ensues.
Download or read book The Chicago Companion to Tocqueville s Democracy in America written by James T. Schleifer and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2012-04-02 with total page 213 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One of the greatest books ever to be written on the United States, Democracy in America continues to find new readers who marvel at the lasting insights Alexis de Tocqueville had into our nation and its political culture. The work is, however, as challenging as it is important; its arguments can be complex and subtle, and its sheer length can make it difficult for any reader, especially one coming to it for the first time, to grasp Tocqueville’s meaning. The Chicago Companion to Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America” is the first book written expressly to help general readers and students alike get the most out of this seminal work. Now James T. Schleifer, an expert on Tocqueville, has provided the background and information readers need in order to understand Tocqueville’s masterwork. In clear and engaging prose, Schleifer explains why Democracy in America is so important, how it came to be written, and how different generations of Americans have interpreted it since its publication. He also presents indispensable insight on who Tocqueville was, his trip to America, and what he meant by equality, democracy, and liberty. Drawing upon his intimate knowledge of Tocqueville’s papers and manuscripts, Schleifer reveals how Tocqueville’s ideas took shape and changed even in the course of writing the book. At the same time, Schleifer provides a detailed glossary of key terms and key passages, all accompanied by generous citations to the relevant pages in the University of Chicago Press Mansfield/Winthrop translation. TheChicago Companion will serve generations of readers as an essential guide to both the man and his work.
Download or read book The Old Regime and the Revolution written by Alexis de Tocqueville and published by . This book was released on 1856 with total page 364 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Alexis de Tocqueville and Gustave de Beaumont in America written by Alexis de Tocqueville and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A selection of Tocqueville's writings on America together with letters and sketches from his traveling companion, Gustave de Beaumont.
Download or read book Alexis de Tocqueville Democracy in America LOA 147 written by Alexis de Tocqueville and published by Library of America. This book was released on 2004-02-09 with total page 960 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An exclusive new translation of the most perceptive and influential book ever written about American politics and society—“the bible on democracy” (The Texas Observer) Alexis de Tocqueville, a young aristocratic French lawyer, came to the United States in 1831 to study its penitentiary systems. His nine-month visit and subsequent reading and reflection resulted in this landmark masterpiece of political observation and analysis. In Democracy in America, Tocqueville vividly describes the unprecedented social equality he found in America and explores its implications for European society in the emerging modern era. His book provides enduring insight into the political consequences of widespread property ownership, the potential dangers to liberty inherent in majority rule, the vital role of religion in American life, and the importance of civil institutions in an individualistic culture dominated by the pursuit of material self-interest. He also probes the deep differences between the free and slave states, writing prophetically of racism, bigotry, and prejudice in the United States. Brought to life by Arthur Goldhammer’s clear, fluid, and vigorous translation, this volume of Democracy in America is the first to fully capture Tocqueville’s achievements both as an accomplished literary stylist and as a profound political thinker.
Download or read book Democracy in America written by Alexis de Tocqueville and published by Macmillan Higher Education. This book was released on 2008-08-08 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This new edition of Democracy in America makes Tocqueville’s classic nineteenth-century study of American politics, society, and culture available — finally! — in a brief and accessible version. Designed for instructors who are eager to teach the work but reluctant to assign all 700 plus pages, Kammen’s careful abridgment features the most well-known chapters that by scholarly consensus are most representative of Tocqueville’s thinking on a wide variety of issues. A comprehensive introduction provides historical and intellectual background, traces the author’s journey in America, helps students unpack the meaning behind key Tocquevillian concepts like "individualism," "equality," and "tyranny of the majority," and discusses the work’s reception and legacy. Newly translated, this edition offers instructors a convenient and affordable option for exploring this essential work with their students. Useful pedagogic features include a chronology, questions for consideration, a selected bibliography, illustrations, and an index.
Download or read book Tocqueville in America written by George Wilson Pierson and published by JHU Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 1764 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Alexis de Tocqueville and Gustave de Beaumont, traveled the breadth of America to inquire into the future of French society as revolutionary upheaval gave way to a representative government similar to America's. This text reconstructs from their diaries and letters and newspaper accounts their nine-month tour and evolving analysis of American society.
Download or read book Tocqueville s Discovery of America written by Leo Damrosch and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2010-04-07 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Alexis de Tocqueville is more quoted than read; commentators across the political spectrum invoke him as an oracle who defined America and its democracy for all times. But in fact his masterpiece, Democracy in America, was the product of a young man's open-minded experience of America at a time of rapid change. In Tocqueville's Discovery of America, the prizewinning biographer Leo Damrosch retraces Tocqueville's nine-month journey through the young nation in 1831–1832, illuminating how his enduring ideas were born of imaginative interchange with America and Americans, and painting a vivid picture of Jacksonian America. Damrosch shows that Tocqueville found much to admire in the dynamism of American society and in its egalitarian ideals. But he was offended by the ethos of grasping materialism and was convinced that the institution of slavery was bound to give rise to a tragic civil war. Drawing on documents and letters that have never before appeared in English, as well as on a wide range of scholarship, Tocqueville's Discovery of America brings the man, his ideas, and his world to startling life.
Download or read book Tocqueville and American Civilization written by Max Lerner and published by Transaction Publishers. This book was released on with total page 148 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Art of Being Free written by James Poulos and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2017-01-17 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Most folks probably don't learn about Alexis de Tocqueville in school anymore, but his seminal work, Democracy in America, is still surprisingly resonant. When he came to America in 1831 to study our great political experiment, he reported that the main issues were: religion, money, sex, death, love, gender inequality, work and politics. Clearly, we haven't come as far as one might hope. But it wasn't all doom and gloom. De Tocqueville not only cataloged our problems; he also provided a manual on how to solve them. In The Art of Being Free, journalist and scholar James Poulos parses de Tocqueville's advice for a modern audience, showing us how to live a sane, healthy, and happy life, regardless of the hectic world around us. Poulos dives into the original, beloved text to see what Tocqueville would say about our relationship to technology; our methods for coping with stress; our obsession with appearances; our workaholism; and our physical indolence. He explores how our uniquely American malaise might be alleviated, not by the next wellness or self-help craze, but by the kind of inner inventory-taking that has fallen out of fashion. Like Sarah Bakewell's How to Live or Alain de Botton's How Proust Can Change Your Life, The Art of Being Free offers a vital new twist on a collection of timeless wisdom--for Americans of all ages."--
Download or read book The Fragility of Freedom written by Joshua Mitchell and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1999-05-15 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this fresh interpretation of Tocqueville's thought, Joshua Mitchell explores the dynamic interplay between religion and politics in American democracy. Focusing on Democracy in America, The Fragility of Freedom examines Tocqueville's key works and argues that his analysis of democracy is ultimately rooted in an Augustinian view of human psychology. As much a work of political philosophy as of religion, The Fragility of Freedom argues for the importance of a political theology that recognizes moderation. "An intelligent and sharply drawn portrait of a conservative Toqueville."—Anne C. Rose, Journal of American History "I recommend this book as one of a very few to approach seriously the sources of Tocqueville's intellectual and moral greatness."—Peter Augustine Lawler, Journal of Politics "Mitchell ably places Democracy in America in the long conversation of Western political and theological thought."—Wilfred M. McClay, First Things "Learned and thought-provoking."—Peter Berkowitz, New Republic
Download or read book Tocqueville between Two Worlds written by Sheldon S. Wolin and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2009-02-09 with total page 697 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Alexis de Tocqueville may be the most influential political thinker in American history. He also led an unusually active and ambitious career in French politics. In this magisterial book, one of America's most important contemporary theorists draws on decades of research and thought to present the first work that fully connects Tocqueville's political and theoretical lives. In doing so, Sheldon Wolin presents sweeping new interpretations of Tocqueville's major works and of his place in intellectual history. As he traces the origins and impact of Tocqueville's ideas, Wolin also offers a profound commentary on the general trajectory of Western political life over the past two hundred years. Wolin proceeds by examining Tocqueville's key writings in light of his experiences in the troubled world of French politics. He portrays Democracy in America, for example, as a theory of discovery that emerged from Tocqueville's contrasting experiences of America and of France's constitutional monarchy. He shows us how Tocqueville used Recollections to reexamine his political commitments in light of the revolutions of 1848 and the threat of socialism. He portrays The Old Regime and the French Revolution as a work of theoretical history designed to throw light on the Bonapartist despotism he saw around him. Throughout, Wolin highlights the tensions between Tocqueville's ideas and his activities as a politician, arguing that--despite his limited political success--Tocqueville was ''perhaps the last influential theorist who can be said to have truly cared about political life.'' In the course of the book, Wolin also shows that Tocqueville struggled with many of the forces that constrain politics today, including the relentless advance of capitalism, of science and technology, and of state bureaucracy. He concludes that Tocqueville's insights and anxieties about the impotence of politics in a ''postaristocratic'' era speak directly to the challenges of our own ''postdemocratic'' age. A monumental new study of Tocqueville, this is also a rich and provocative work about the past, the present, and the future of democratic life in America and abroad.
Download or read book American Vertigo written by Bernard-Henri Lévy and published by Random House. This book was released on 2007-12-18 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What does it mean to be an American, and what can America be today? To answer these questions, celebrated philosopher and journalist Bernard-Henri Lévy spent a year traveling throughout the country in the footsteps of another great Frenchman, Alexis de Tocqueville, whose Democracy in America remains the most influential book ever written about our country. The result is American Vertigo, a fascinating, wholly fresh look at a country we sometimes only think we know. From Rikers Island to Chicago mega-churches, from Muslim communities in Detroit to an Amish enclave in Iowa, Lévy investigates issues at the heart of our democracy: the special nature of American patriotism, the coexistence of freedom and religion (including the religion of baseball), the prison system, the “return of ideology” and the health of our political institutions, and much more. He revisits and updates Tocqueville’s most important beliefs, such as the dangers posed by “the tyranny of the majority,” explores what Europe and America have to learn from each other, and interprets what he sees with a novelist’s eye and a philosopher’s depth. Through powerful interview-based portraits across the spectrum of the American people, from prison guards to clergymen, from Norman Mailer to Barack Obama, from Sharon Stone to Richard Holbrooke, Lévy fills his book with a tapestry of American voices–some wise, some shocking. Both the grandeur and the hellish dimensions of American life are unflinchingly explored. And big themes emerge throughout, from the crucial choices America faces today to the underlying reality that, unlike the “Old World,” America remains the fulfillment of the world’s desire to worship, earn, and live as one wishes–a place, despite all, where inclusion remains not just an ideal but an actual practice. At a time when Americans are anxious about how the world perceives them and, indeed, keen to make sense of themselves, a brilliant and sympathetic foreign observer has arrived to help us begin a new conversation about the meaning of America.
Download or read book From Vienna to Chicago and Back written by Gerald Stourzh and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2010-02-15 with total page 412 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Spanning both the history of the modern West and his own five-decade journey as a historian, Gerald Stourzh’s sweeping new essay collection covers the same breadth of topics that has characterized his career—from Benjamin Franklin to Gustav Mahler, from Alexis de Tocqueville to Charles Beard, from the notion of constitution in seventeenth-century England to the concept of neutrality in twentieth-century Austria. This storied career brought him in the 1950s from the University of Vienna to the University of Chicago—of which he draws a brilliant picture—and later took him to Berlin and eventually back to Austria. One of the few prominent scholars equally at home with U.S. history and the history of central Europe, Stourzh has informed these geographically diverse experiences and subjects with the overarching themes of his scholarly achievement: the comparative study of liberal constitutionalism and the struggle for equal rights at the core of Western notions of free government. Composed between 1953 and 2005 and including a new autobiographical essay written especially for this volume, From Vienna to Chicago and Back will delight Stourzh fans, attract new admirers, and make an important contribution to transatlantic history.
Download or read book People of Paradox written by Michael Kammen and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2012-10-03 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this major interpretive work Mr. Kammen argues that most attempt to understand America’s history and culture have minimized its complexity, and he demonstrates that, from our beginnings, what has given our culture its distinctive texture, pattern, and thrust is the dynamic interaction of the imported and the indigenous. He shows now, during the years of colonization, especially in the century from 1660 to 1760, many ideas and institutions were transferred virtually unchanged from Britain, while, simultaneously, others were being transformed in the New World environment. As he unravels the tangled origins of our “bittersweet” culture, Mr. Kammen makes us see that unresolved contradictions in the American experience have functioned as the prime characteristic of our national style. Puritanical and hedonistic, idealistic and materialistic, peace-loving and war-mongering, isolationist and interventionist, consensus-minded and conflict-prone—these opposing strands go back to the roots of our history. He pursues them down through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries—from the traumas of colonization and settlement through the tensions of the American Revolution—making clear both the relevance of this early experience to ninetieth and twentieth-century realities and the way in which America’ dualisms have endured and accumulated to produced such dilemmas as today’s poverty amidst abundance and legitimized lawlessness. Far from being a study in social pathology, People of Paradox is a depiction of a complex society and am explanations of its development—a bold interpretation that gives an entirely new perceptive to the American ethos.
Download or read book The American Commonwealth written by James Bryce and published by . This book was released on 1891 with total page 772 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Democracy in America Volumes 1 and 2 Unabridged translated by Henry Reeve with an Introduction by John Bigelow written by Alexis De Tocqueville and published by Digireads.com. This book was released on 2016-09 with total page 690 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1831, the then twenty-seven year old Alexis de Tocqueville, was sent with Gustave de Beaumont to America by the French Government to study and make a report on the American prison system. Over a period of nine months the two traveled all over America making notes not only on the prison systems but on all aspects of American society and government. From these notes Tocqueville wrote "Democracy in America," an exhaustive analysis of the successes and failures of the American form of government, a republican representative democracy. Tocqueville believed that over the past seven hundred years the social and economic conditions of humanity were progressively becoming more equal. The future was, in his opinion, inevitably drawing humanity towards the democratic ideal thus diminishing the power of the aristocracy. Tocqueville's predictions of the changing nature of human civilization seem almost clairvoyant in retrospect. First published in two volumes in 1835 and 1840, "Democracy in America" remains one of the most important historical documents of America and political analysis of its form of government. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper, includes both unabridged volumes as translated by Henry Reeve, and an introduction by John Bigelow.
