DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA

Democracy in America

Democracy in America

Introduction

Democracy in America (published in two books, the first in 1835, the second in 1840), is a classic French text written by Alexis de Tocqueville on the United States in 1830, in which he describes and analyzes the political system of U.S. and outlines the possible draconian excesses of passion for equality among men. The second volume is a reflection on the forms of American democracy. This reflection is extended to general considerations on democracy, including the risk of tyranny of the majority. The work discusses the influence that democracy has on civil society that is to say about the manners, ideas and intellectual life. To summarize, we can say that the first volume is geographical while the second one is sociological and moral.

Tocqueville speculated on the future of democracy in the United States, and the potential dangers "to democracy". He wrote that democracy has a tendency to degenerate into what he described as "the despotism soft.”

Description and Analysis

This work acclaimed de Tocqueville, predicted for several events that eventually manifested themselves. It correctly predicted the debate on the abolition of slavery when America tears during its civil war. It also predicts the emergence of the United States and Russia as the two superpowers of the world, leading to the polarization (that the world would know as the Cold War). In addition, the opportunity presented in this book that people come to give up their freedom in favor of greater equality, manifested itself in the twentieth century in the form of various totalitarian regimes. Democracy is primarily a political system based on institutions, but for Tocqueville, is more than a social state where there is equality of conditions and subjective feelings, "the passion for equality.” In America, popular sovereignty, based on the majority principle, is inextricably linked to social democracy i.e. men are free and equal (Swedberg, 2009).

Equality of political rights, pluralism of opinions and universal suffrage are characteristic of the mode of power in a democracy. The equality of civil rights has social consequences. Thus, the absence of primogeniture and equal sharing of inheritance modify the behavior and opinions in a sustainable way, as everyone owns the power associated with the earth is spread, and everyone is aware of the need to maintain the right property to keep his property and his freedom to act (doctrine "in the interest of course" or ...