Talk:Alexis de Tocqueville

message: Any sources for the Tocqueville effect? Please help us at the german wikipedia http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diskussion:Alexis_de_Tocqueville — Preceding unsigned comment added by 84.166.127.171 (talk) 00:21, 19 June 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tocqueville effect 

message: Roanoke Times (July 1, 2005): "Roanoke College political science professor Bill Hill looked up 19th century politician John Taylor of Caroline County, political philosopher Alexis De Tocqueville and the Federalist Papers. 'In each case, the program responded with information that was accurate and pertinent, if brief," he wrote. "I thought the coverage of De Tocqueville, however, was too superficial.'
...
A feature of the Wikipedia that Hill likes are the links to original sources. It's pretty handy when reading about De Tocqueville to be able to click a link and read the man's own words. But Hill also noted a link that led to a 'very brief and shallow essay' about states' rights." — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gettingtoit (talk • contribs) 19:33, 1 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Outside assessment 

message: The quotes should be included on the page, just because they are also on wikiquote doesn't mean they should be removed. It's alright if they appear in more than one place. --Nyr14 July 7, 2005 03:27 (UTC)
: This is far too many quotes. 2 or 3? Fine. A list like this? That is exactly what Wikiquote is for. -- Jmabel | Talk July 8, 2005 04:35 (UTC)
::I vote for these 3 then:
::*"The American Republic will endure, until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money."
::*"Americans are so enamoured of equality they would rather be equal in slavery than unequal in freedom."
::*"Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word, equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude."
::--Nyr14 July 8, 2005 12:23 (UTC)
Hi - the quotes on the main page are highly dubious.  I fixed one that was definitely reversed from its actual meaning, but many of the rest of these look suspicious as well.  Somebody should consider deleting all the quotations and re-posting only validated quotes with sources. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.72.81.208 (talk) 20:47, 20 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I think all the quotes should be removed (Wikiquote exists for that). Quotes should be included within the article text, not just a list. Gflores Talk 22:03, 8 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quotes 

message: The article says that de Tocqueville "championed" both liberty and democracy.  I find this a poor summary of his thesis; I see him critiquing it more than championing it.  From the cover of my de Tocqueville book:  "Tocqueville discusses the advantages and dangers of majority rule--which he thought could be as tyrannical as the rule of the aristocracy."   Richard D. Heffner  Italic textDemocracy in AmericaItalic text  (New York:  Penguin Group , 1984). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.191.212.100 (talk) 02:38, 17 December 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: Did Tocqueville not coin the phrase 'Tyranny of the majority' thereby proposing liberal or constitutional, rather than total, democracy?208.114.132.151 23:06, 2 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I believe that was Mill, not d.T  [- r] — Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.136.200.156 (talk) 23:54, 17 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Poor summary

message: I removed the purely subjective observations on "the best translation ..." --Thorsen 13:13, 22 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Purely subjective observations removed 

message: Where do I start?  For one thing, Tocqueville's work here sounds like a bland encomium to American democracy.  "He championed freedom and liberty" is both simplistic and strongly biased.  The article seeks to convert him posthumously to American-style conservatism, progressivism, and classical liberalism; why stop there, when communitarians and others call him one of their own? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.23.68.36 (talk) 05:18, 2 February 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: well, he DID champion freedom and liberty, although to say so is redundant, since the word he originally used, 'liberte', means both. A better expression might be 'he championed both freedom and equality', though, again, his views were never quite that simple. I'm curious, though: where's the bias, exactly? Conservative buzzword it might be, but freedom is hardly a uniquely american value. I've changed the sentence in the article to something less controversial and more accurate. Tocque35 05:35, 15 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: America-centric

message: "'We are sleeping on a volcano... A wind of revolution blows, the storm is on the horizon.'(Speaking in the Chamber of Deputies, 1848, just prior to the outbreak of revolution in Europe)", could someone please define the context of De Toqueville's quote a little more specifically? There has never been a Europe-wide revolution, and my history isn't good enough to know the exact context in which he was speaking. Oktober 14:57, 14 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: 1848 was pretty close to Europe-wide. See Revolutions of 1848. -- Jmabel | Talk 01:22, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  European Revolution 

message: The article looks a lot better now, I think--particularly with the bit about soft despotism and individualism.  I've added a link to Benjamin Constant.  It may be in the wrong place, though.
I was also thinking about adding a note about the Tocqueville revival among liberal French historians (e.g., François Furet, Marcel Gauchet), but I don't think I know enough about it.  Does anyone else?--WadeMcR 21:16, 31 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I think Raymond Aron was the one to introduce him first as an important thinker, but I don't know if it's really relevant to the topic (it's probably more relevant to Raymond Aron's entry, same goes for Furet & others). Lapaz 04:40, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Benjamin Constant/french historians 

message: "Convoluted" would be a mild -- and essential -- interpretation. Virtually every leading scholar would completely agree with me on this. We could offer countless references to the repetition and poor grammar, but we simply will not be made to read through it all again. Merely one of many, many which could have been cited: 
:"His first travel inspired his Travail sur l'Algérie, in which he criticized the French model of colonization, based on an assimilationist view, to which he preferred the British model of indirect rule, which didn't mix different populations together." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.150.252.231 (talk) 20:26, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  About The Article In General 

message: The alleged quote "Democracy and socialism..." does not occur in "Democracy in America" The word socialism does not occur.
- Pepper 150.203.227.130 11:37, 3 November 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Not a single one of the quotations given here is cited for. And this is not WikiQuote, anyway. Can't we get rid of this section, and just link to WikiQuote, or pare it down to three characteristic, well-cited quotations? - Jmabel | Talk 20:04, 5 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quotations 

message: I had never heard of Alexis de Tocqueville before hearing of the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution, and when I eventually had a look at this page, it still wasn't clear to me (at all) who Alexis de Tocqueville was. The intro mumbles something about him writing two books in which he "explored the myriad and profound effects of the rising equality of social conditions on both the individual and the state in western societies", but it does not immediately explain which ideas he defended, or why these books are considered notorious. It would be of great help to a person not immediately familiar with the subject if such a summary were added to the article. Yoe 14:38, 13 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Summary of his ideas? 

message: All things considered, I think Wikipedia would be doing its readers a service by simply removing this article after the first short paragraph. Everything else in it is highly tendentious. It also sins greatly by omission, by not devoting a word of discussion to The Old Regime. The article is worse than useless - it actively misleads its readers as to what T was about.
This is Wikipedia at its worst. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.91.36.237 (talk) 11:07, 20 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Article is a liability 

message: How could the editors of this section go on and on about the various differences Tocqueville noted between America and Europe, without mentioning religion, one of Tocqueville's primary explanations for the cause of these differences?  Currently the article rambles about how Tocqueville strove to find out why the common man in America enjoyed high levels of dignity, possesses much "natural" power, and never deferred to so-called "elites"; why America never embraced socialism; and why America "was set apart by its peculiar democratic mores".  The article, as it currently stands, implies that Tocqueville believed that these differences were ONLY due to economic factors (property ownership, vast available land, and industriousness).  While Tocqueville may have attributed the differences between America and Europe to some economic factors, he often stated that the differences were also heavily due to the religious and spiritual practices prevalent among Americans.  I can quickly cite a couple examples of this, stated by Tocqueville himself:
* "Religion in American takes no direct part in the government of society, but it must be regarded as the first of their political institutions; for if it does not impart a taste for freedom, it facilitates the use of it. Indeed, it is in this same point of view that the inhabitants of the United States themselves look upon religious belief. I do not know whether all Americans have a sincere faith in their religion for who can search the human heart?— but I am certain that they hold it to be indispensable to the maintenance of republican institutions. This opinion is not peculiar to a class of citizens or to a party, but it belongs to the whole nation and to every rank of society." --Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America (New York: Vintage Books, 1945), Vol. 1, p. 316   
* "Despotism may govern without faith, but liberty cannot. Religion is much more necessary in the republic . . . than in the monarchy . . . it is more needed in democratic republics than in any others. How is it possible that society should escape destruction if the moral tie is not strengthened in proportion as the political tie is relaxed? And what can be done with a people who are their own masters if they are not submissive to the Deity?" --Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America (New York: Vintage Books, 1945), Vol. 1, p. 318    
Alas, the bias in Wikipedia may never end! Gaytan 00:17, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Please, work on getting this into the article. I doubt there is any active bias here, just omission. This is not a particularly good article; it needs a lot of work; this is just one example of the work to be done. - Jmabel | Talk 18:04, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I, too, am sorely disappointed to see that nothing was said about religion in America. If I rememeber from my research correctly, he believed religious freedom (and the simple existence and uplifted standpoint of the church) was the primary reason America was successful as a democracy. Colonel Marksman 08:09, 31 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Democracy in America section fails to mention role of religion in America 

message: How do you pronunciate his surname? --Harac 12:13, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: (TOKE-vill)Lincoln1809 (talk) 18:14, 17 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pronunciation 

message: I think it would be useful if the article covered Tocqueville's travels throughout the U.S. and Canada.  I don't have the time to research and write this, but I think that would be a helpful expansion. Stevie is the man! Talk • Work 17:17, 22 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Coverage of travels in America 

message: The article states he was part of the liberal tradition. Which liberal tradition? Classic liberalism, like Adam Smith, or social liberalism, like Emile Durkheim? Signaturebrendel 06:47, 25 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Most definitely NOT social liberalism.  In fact, I think he said (without explicitly using the term) that something like social liberalism would develop in a democracy because the people would demand "equality" and that it would eventually lead to despotism.  See Volume 2, Book 4 of Democracy in America. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.184.226.117 (talk) 05:37, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Which liberal 

message: I propose to add a few pieces of information on Tocqueville, which results from new research in 2003-2007 on Chopin and Jenny Lind's newly discovered romance in 1848-1849:
#Tocqueville's friendship and correspondence with Nassau W. Senior;
#Tocqueville's possible role on Jenny Lind getting permission to organize Chopin's lavish funeral at Eglise de la Madeleine (a period source suggests that Tocqueville may also have attended the funeral).
#Tocqueville died of tuberculosis (like Chopin and many others).
Under what subheadings could item 2 best be put? Jean de Beaumont (talk) 09:04, 20 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Items 1 and 3 now uploaded. Jean de Beaumont (talk) 10:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  New research 

message: This section is way too long, considering that this the de Tocqueville article not the Democracy in America page.  There should be a section on the book, but not a summary of the book itself. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Mynameisnotpj (talk • contribs) 12:38, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Democracy in America 

message: The second paragraph is nonsensical: "He retired from political life after Louis Napoléon Bonaparte's December 2, 1851 coup, and thereafter began work on The Old Regime and the Revolution, Volume I o a law degree, Alexis de Tocqueville was named auditor-magistrate at the court of Versailles."
Two unrelated chunks of text have been stuck together, each broken off in mid-sentence.  It also leaps back in time nearly 30 years with this transition.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.172.19.20 (talk) 17:22, 16 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Broken editing 

message: tocqueville did not use a word "civique" in his work. i replaced it with "political". his work is also about political society not a civil society, hewever he uses the second term also. i have added "political society" in the first place. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Discourseur (talk • contribs) 15:30, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  civique 

message: Would this link be worthy of inclusion in the external links?
* Unprophetic Tocqueville: How Democracy in America Got the Modern World Completely Wrong: a reassessment of Tocqueville's intellectual standing and legacy from the perspective of economic and industrial history in the Independent Review.  Hellenic9 (talk) 17:19, 30 June 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Suggested external link

message: helping hands needed! AfD was put on political society article. The idea seems to be invented by Tocqueville. He pay great importance to it in Democracy in America, as well as to 'political association' concept (there is different chapter on it). --discourseur 10:16, 2 August 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  political society 

message: I wonder if there is some way of including this comparatively recent work on the de Tocqueville page. From POV, it brings further clarity to the many of the themes and issues that de Tocqueville addresses in DiA, and is immeasurably pertinent to anyone wishing to study this fine scholar. 
If we forget any such statements, it is surely deserving of inclusion as the author makes expicit reference to how he is emulating de Tocqueville. The conclusions that can be drawn from American Vertigo may be markedly different to those in DiA, and may also be POV, however it would be an error to not include some synposis and details about this work.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cvmuk (talk • contribs) 11:10, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bernard Henri Levy - American Vertigo 

message: This article seems somewhat suspect, ie. biased, in that it is very focussed on attempting to paint the man as a hypocrite, disproportionately favouring exposition regarding his personal life over the reason the page exists in the first place, namely his works, without any attempt to refer to his or scholars' interpretations of why he would have temporarily supported certain regimes, and opposed the illiberal nature of the "reformers," towards the ends of his life. 99.232.109.179 (talk) 05:25, 14 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bias 

message: I took out the quote about "bribing the public with the public's money"; I searched in several online editions of "Democracy in America" and didn't find the quote. I also failed to find it in several other works of Tocqueville; I'm not certain it is an authentic quote, although it is online in numerous places attributed to him. Brianyoumans (talk) 13:54, 10 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bribing the Public quote 

message: I'm not sure whether it's appropriate to present this kind of reference here or not, but Tocqueville was also quoted in "Deus Ex: Invisible War" videogame.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 213.251.211.17 (talk) 21:44, 15 September 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  References in culture 

message: This article takes a windy path in order to avoid Tocqueville's love for liberty.  It is absolutely ridiculous that this article portrays the man as some sort of apologist to those that support liberty.  The summary of Democracy in America totally misses the point.  You have to be nuts if that is what you took away from it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 60.241.132.126 (talk) 13:44, 10 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Very biased towards government intervention and socialism 

message: Why do people always point to how much he loved "liberty" and religion (Christianity only), but they totally ignore what a totally racist bastard he was? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.187.167.234 (talk) 09:40, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Do you want to rephrase that question in a way that can be useful to improving the article?  There are quite a few quotes about his views of the race situation and slavery in the US.  If you feel they are misrepresenting or whitewashing his views, you need to explain how and back it up. Mezigue (talk) 10:20, 3 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Bias 

message: The section on Democracy in America is full of opinions, lacks citations, and is often off topic. I started adding "citation needed" to the sources. I stopped, as often times, it was not even a matter of lack of citation but flat out opinions. I do not feel like my involvement in the wiki community warrants me removing large chunks of someone else's work. If someone with more experience with the process should look at this section -- tout suite.  19:08, 18 July 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Democracy in American section; request for major edit

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: "Tocqueville's professed religion was Roman Catholicism.[11] He saw religion as being compatible with both equality and individualism, and felt that religion would be strongest when separated from politics."
Um, why is this in the section called "Death"? Is the contention that Tocqueville's Catholicism killed him? Look, this is an interesting observation, but it certainly does not belong in this section! GeneCallahan (talk) 06:13, 10 August 2016 (UTC)
thread_title:  Death 

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: What was Alexis de Tocqueville's full name? According to Lexico (formely Oxford Dictionaries) it was Alexis Charles Henri Maurice Clérel de Tocqueville. I understand that "de Tocqueville" is toponymic — the thing I'm confused about is "Maurice". Also, are there any hyphens in his name? —CaiusSPQR (talk) 03:38, 13 August 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Full name 

message: And alas, I do not have the expertise to fix it, but having just read it, I can say for sure based on reading its self-contradicting content and then consequently reading the Talk page, that it (the article) is a biased mess twisted in line with someone's, or several someones', ill-reasoned beliefs, devoid of logic, which seemingly someone hopes to validate by quoting de Tocqueville in some permutation of the Appeal to Authority fallacy.
When I opened up the talk to see if anybody else was thinking the same I saw that similar contentions have been going on for over fifteen years.
What on Earth is going on with this article? 80.71.142.35 (talk) 20:44, 6 June 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  This article is a mess. 

message: The articles says: "Tocqueville warned that modern democracy may be adept at inventing new forms of tyranny because radical equality could lead to the materialism of an expanding bourgeoisie and to the selfishness of individualism." But instead of citing what Tocqueville said, there are citations of some James Wood and Josua Kaplan what according to them Tocqueville said. Horrible. Dubiel (talk) 19:59, 7 August 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tocqueville warned of tyranny 

message: I will remove the last sentence of the introduction, since that characterization is extremely misleading. "Left" in Tocqueville's age and context usually meant "Classical Liberal," which in modern times is considered Rightist. And even as a classical liberal Tocqueville was very conservative; he was a firm believer in Christianity and meritocracy, as well as a strong critic of collectivism and state power—all of which are classical Right-wing stances. This is also why no actual leftists (Marxists, Anarchists etc.) read him or quote him. Tocqueville is a Rightist by all modern standards.
Here are some authoritative sources that identify Tocqueville as a Rightist:
* Kahan, Alan S., Major Conservative and Libertarian Thinkers: Alexis de Tocqueville (2013)
* Lakoff, Sandoff, "Tocqueville, Burke, and the Origins of Liberal Conservatism" (1998, p. 435)
* Söderbaum, Jakob E:son, Modern konservatism (2020, p. 65)
In the article, the lists of philosophers Tocqueville influenced, and was influenced by, are also dominated by Right-wingers. Out of 46 names that are only a few distinct Leftists; the rest are Rightists or tilt towards the Right. There is not a shadow of a doubt to which side of the political spectrum Tocqueville belongs. Trakking (talk) 15:10, 19 August 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removal of extremely misleading characterization of Tocqueville