Observations of Alexis de Tocqueville

One of the earliest analyses of American culture was that of Alexis de Tocqueville, who traveled the country in 1835 and 1840. In his Democracy in America, De Tocqueville reported on what Americans thought of themselves, and much of what he writes evokes the traditions and myths by which Americans are identified to this day. Among the traditions De Tocqueville cites about American society are the notion of rights for everyone, the public spirit of the people, and the general respect for law. He also addresses the question of the possibility of the tyranny of the majority and the ways in which this is mitigated as he writes: "But in the United States the majority which so frequently displays the tastes and the propensities of a despot, is still destitute of the more perfect instruments of tyranny" (De Tocqueville 261). De Tocqueville then shows how the minority is protected from the tyranny of the majority by provisions in the U.S. Constitution, a theme that can be found in many other writers on American political traditions. Commentators such as Samuel P. Huntington and Benjamin Barber refer to De Tocqueville directly and indirectly.

Alexis de Tocqueville set out with a particular goal in mind--he wanted to describe the way in which a particular social condition, that of equality, made itself felt in the political institutions of the American nation and in the customs, habits, and manners of the citizenry. The social condition of equality is the moving force and p

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; new media such as computers crete even greater fragmentation into groups; and neighborhoods have become balkanized along racial and ethnic lines, further separating people from any central idea of America. The key to our values lies in the relationship that exists between our private and our public lives, and the life-style enclaves that seem to have developed place more emphasis on the private life and see public life within a specific life-style sphere that is separate from any central public life with a broader scope. Differences have been magnified across class lines--life style is definitely related to income level and social distinctions in spite of the emphasis on individualism. Society has been fragmented by political and social upheavals into groupings around certain income levels, ideas, even locations. De Tocqueville had predicted some of this when he said the private sphere would contract and people would come to live in small coteries. In our present society, we are faced with massive concentrations of economic power, great inequality of wealth, and the near-disappearance of the self-employed farmer, merchant, and artisan. We have thus moved some way from the conditions in early America, and so from the cond

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