Many American readers like to regard Alexis de Tocqueville as an
honorary American and democrat--as the young French aristocrat who
came to early America and, enthralled by what he saw, proceeded to
write an American book explaining democratic America to itself.
Yet, as Lucien Jaume argues in this acclaimed intellectual
biography, "Democracy in America" is best understood as a French
book, written primarily for the French, and overwhelmingly
concerned with France. "America," Jaume says, "was merely a pretext
for studying modern society and the woes of France." For
Tocqueville, in short, America was a mirror for France, a way for
Tocqueville to write indirectly about his own society, to engage
French thinkers and debates, and to come to terms with France's
aristocratic legacy.
By taking seriously the idea that Tocqueville's French context
is essential for understanding "Democracy in America," Jaume
provides a powerful and surprising new interpretation of
Tocqueville's book as well as a fresh intellectual and
psychological portrait of the author. Situating Tocqueville in the
context of the crisis of authority in postrevolutionary France,
Jaume shows that Tocqueville was an ambivalent promoter of
democracy, a man who tried to reconcile himself to the coming wave,
but who was also nostalgic for the aristocratic world in which he
was rooted--and who believed that it would be necessary to preserve
aristocratic values in order to protect liberty under democracy.
Indeed, Jaume argues that one of Tocqueville's most important and
original ideas was to recognize that democracy posed the threat of
a new and hidden form of despotism.
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