Major Works

• Democracy In America

  - Recommended translation: Tocqueville, Alexis de. Democracy in America. Edited and translated by Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. Volume I originally published in 1835. Volume II originally published in 1840.
  Excerpt: "Among the novel objects that attracted my attention during my stay in the United States, nothing struck me more forcibly than the general equality of condition among the people. I readily discovered the prodigious influence that this primary fact… More

Other Works

• Correspondence and Conversation with Nassau Williams

  - Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, ed. M.C.M. Simpson, in Two Volumes (London: Henry S. King & Co., 1872)
  Excerpt: Alexis de Tocqueville to N.W. Senior March 24, 1834. My dear Mr. Senior,– I hope that you have not yet entirely forgotten one who will always remember your kind reception with gratitude. I take to-day the liberty of asking you to bestow a… More

• Journeys to England and Ireland

  - Journeys to England and Ireland, ed. J.P. Mayer, trans. George Lawrence and K.P. Mayer (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1958)
  Excerpt: Well, here I am at Tocqueville, in my old family ruin. A  league away is the harbour from which William set out to conquer England. I am surrounded by Normans whose names figure in the lists of the conquerors. All that, I must admit, ‘flatters… More

Commentary

• Leo Strauss on Alexis de Tocqueville

  - Leo Strauss on Alexis de Tocqueville.  Transcript from class session.
  Excerpt: Tocqueville, living two generations after Burke, accepted modern democracy on a Burkian basis, without accepting all the [?] of natural religion.  That is the starting point of Tocqueville.  Tocqueville was here for a very short time, making some… More

• “M. de Tocqueville on Democracy in America” by J.S. Mill

  - Cohen, Marshall, ed. The Philosophy of John Stuart Mill. New York: The Modern Library, 1961.
  Fascinating review of Tocqueville’s Democracy in America by Tocqueville’s colleague and correspondent, John Stuart Mill. The letter reveals the enormous respect Mill had for Tocqueville but also the differences between the two thinkers, even as… More

• Main Currents in Sociological Thought

  - Raymond Aron, Main Currents in Sociological Thought: Montesuieu, Compte, Marx, Tocqueville, and the Sociologists and the Revolution of 1848, trans. Richard Howard and Helen Weaver (New York: Basic Books, 1965)
  Excerpt: Tocqueville is not ordinarily included among the founders of sociology; I consider this neglect of Tocqueville’s sociological writings unjustified.  But I have still another reason for wishing to discuss him.  For in studying Montesquieu, Comte,… More

• The Forms and Formalities of Liberty

  - Harvey C. Mansfield, ""The Forms and Formalities of Liberty," The Public Interest, No. 70 (Winter 1983), pp. 121-131."
  Excerpt: This statement is long for an epigraph but dense enough to require explanation, and deep enough to reward reflection. Speaking of “forms,” Tocqueville directs our attention to institutions or practices in which the manner of action is more… More

• Tocqueville and the Problem of Natural Right

  - Robert Eden, "Tocqueville and the Problem of Natural Right" in Interpretation Vol. 17, No. 3 (Sprint 1990)
  Excerpt: “The primary questions of classical political philosophy, and the terms in which it stated them, were not specifically philosophic or scientific; they were questions that are raised in assemblies, councils, clubs and cabinets, and they were… More

• Interpreting Tocqueville’s Democracy in America

  - Interpreting Tocqueville's Democracy in America, ed. Ken Masugi.  (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1991)
  Excerpt: Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-59) is so frequently quoted that his readers may not probe beneath the enticing surface Democracy in America presents.  Many would remain content with pickin and choosing from his text, reading him as others do Montaigne… More

• The Restless Mind: Alexis de Tocqueville on the Origin and Perpetuation of Human Liberty

  - Peter Augustine Lawler, "The Restless Mind: Alexis de Tocqueville on the Origin and Perpetuation of Human Liberty."  (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 1993)
  Excerpt: I begin with socialism for a number of reasons.  Tocqueville saw the socialists as the most extreme and dangerous opponents to human liberty in his time.  His most pressing task as a political actor was to oppose socialist revolution.  He also… More

• Tocqueville’s Defense of Human Liberty

  - Tocqueville’s Defense of Human Liberty, ed. Peter Lawler and Joseph Alulis (New York: Garland Publishing, 1993)
  Excerpt: Tocqueville seems to be the authority in our time for those who see the inadequacy of both bourgeois and socialist life for human beings.  Hence he inspires those who oppose the misanthropic reductionism of apolitical theory of every sort.  Each of… More

• Revolutions Revisited

  - Ralph Lerner, Revolutions Revisisted: Two Faces of the Politics of Enlightenment. (Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 1994)
  Excerpt: The more impressive a work of historical analysis, the greater the likelihood it will deceive.  Whether a popular article or a scholarly monograph, its aura of completeness and balance, even its physical unity, may serve to conceal the field of… More

• An Intellectual History of Liberalism

  - Pierre Manent. An Intellectual History of Liberalism, trans. Rebecca Balinski (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994)
  Excerpt: Is it possible to “end,” to “settle” the Revolution?  How can political institutions appropriate for the new society be constructed?  Tocqueville, like Constant and Guizot, had these questions thrust upon him.  However, they now presented… More

• Self-Interest Rightly Understood

  - Harvey C. Mansfield, "Self-Interest Rightly Understood," Political Theory, vol. 23 (1995), No. 1, pp. 48-66.
  Excerpt: The collapse of communism is an occasion to rethink our bourgeois liberalism, which has surprised everyone, favorable or not, with its success. In particular it is time to have another look at self-interest. For communism is said to have collapsed… More

• The Fragility of Freedom: Tocqueville on Religion, Democracy, and the American Future

  - Joshua Mitchell.  The Fragility of Freedom: Tocqueville on Religion, Democracy, and the American Future. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999)
  Excerpt: The Delphic injunction, “Know thyself,” seems nowhere to have been more happily violated than in the American context. It was, after all, Tocqueville the Frenchman, the stranger in America, who was able to grasp the multiple valences of the… More

• Tocqueville, Political Philosopher

  - Pierre Manent, "Tocqueville, Political Philosopher," trans. Arthur Goldhammer in The Cambridge Companion to Tocqueville,  ed. Cheryl B. Welch.  (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006)
  Excerpt: Since 2002,texts by Tocqueville have been included in the syllabus  for the French Agrégation de Philosophie. What are we to think of this belated promotion of Tocqueville to the rank of  philosopher? Did the sages who draft the syllabi give into… More

• Tocqueville’s New Political Science

  - Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop, "Tocqueville's New Political Science" in The Cambridge Companion to Tocqueville, ed. Cheryl B. Welch.  (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006).
  Excerpt: “A new political science is needed for a world altogether new.” (DAI Intro., 7) Here is a striking statement, given a paragraph to itself, from the Introduction to Tocqueville’s Democracy in America.  Although it could hardly be… More

• Tocqueville: A Very Short Introduction by Harvey Mansfield

  - Mansfield, Harvey C. Tocqueville: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.
  Excerpt: “What sort of man was Alexis de Tocqueville? A writer, certainly, and with great style, but a writer of nonfiction conveying fact and truth in compelling terms with brilliant formulations. A social scientist, but without the cumbersome… More

• “Tocqueville on Human Nature and Natural Right” by Donald Maletz

  - Maletz, Donald J. "Tocqueville on Human Nature and Natural Right." Interpretation 37, no. 2 (Winter 2010)
  Excerpt: Tocqueville’s account of American democracy makes no use of what might be thought one of its philosophical foundations, the theory of natural rights based on an interpretation of abstract and universal human nature. Yet at the same time he offers… More

• A New Kind of Liberalism

  - Harvey C. Mansfield, "A New Kind of Liberalism," New Criterion, March 2010.
  Excerpt: In view of Alexis de Tocqueville’s criticisms of philosophy, it may seem paradoxical and presumptuous to call him a philosopher; yet it was through his critique of philosophy that he set forth a new, rethought liberalism. In Democracy in America,… More

• “Providence and Democracy” by Harvey Mansfield

  - Mansfield, Harvey C. "Providence and Democracy." Claremont Review of Books, Winter/Spring 2010/2011.
  Excerpt: Alexis de Tocqueville was a liberal, but, as he once wrote, a ‘new kind of liberal.’ For us, no feature of his new liberalism is more remarkable than the alliance between religion and liberty that he saw in America and proposed to be… More

• Tocqueville and America

  - James Q. Wilson.  "Tocqueville and America," Claremont Review of Books, Vol. XII, No. 2 (Spring 2012)
  Excerpt of an admiring but critical essay by James Q. Wilson on Tocqueville: Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville is no doubt the greatest book ever written by a foreigner about this country. It may be one of the greatest books written about any… More

Multimedia

• Tocqueville and Liberalism

  - "Tocqueville and Liberalism," C-SPAN Discussion, September 12, 1997
  Tocqueville and Liberalism Professors from the United States and western Europe discussed the impact of the writings of Alexis de Tocqueville as they relate to liberalism. They debated whether Tocqueville was a liberal and whether the definition and scope… More

• Tocqueville and Equality

  - "Tocqueville and Equality," C-Span Discussion, October 22, 1997
  Tocqueville and Equality The panelists discussed Tocqueville’s ideas about equality and democracy from his observations in his book Democracy in America. They examined the reasons that U.S. society has developed relatively little, the possibility of the… More

• Democracy in America

  - "Democracy in America," interview with Brian Lamb, C-SPAN, 17 October 2000.
  Democracy in America Alexis de Tocqueville’s book he wrote on his return to France from America in 1831 remains the most often quoted book about the United States. Harvey Mansfield and Delba Winthrop’s new translation is the first to appear in… More

• Colloquium on Democracy in America

  - Harvey C. Mansfield and Delba Winthrop, "Colloquium on Democracy in America," panel discussion, Ashbrook Center, March 30, 2001.
  Colloquium on Democracy in America Harvey Mansfield and Delba Winthrop’s new translation of Democracy in America (University of Chicago, 2000) is only the third since the original two-volume work was published in 1835 and 1840. It is a spectacular… More

• Harvey Mansfield: In-Depth on Tocqueville

  - "In-Depth with Harvey Mansfield," interview, C-SPAN, September 4 2005.
  In Depth with Harvey Mansfield

• Tocqueville’s Alliance of Religion and Liberty

  - Harvey C. Mansfield, "Tocqueville's Alliance of Religion and Liberty," Lecture at Catholic University, October 8, 2010