Democracy in America was written by Alexis de Tocqueville, a French historian and political thinker after his return from the United States. Tocqueville spent about 9 months in the US travelling and studying its prison system, gathering information on US society, its religions, politics and economics. The Tocqueville work became very popular in the United States and Europe. Harvey Mansfield translated the book into English; in the introduction he wrote that this is the best book ever written on democracy and the best book ever written on the United States. Democracy in America gives better understanding of the processes and events of the present day. No wonder it became a classical work of history, social and political sciences. In his work, the author frequently compares the US to France and other European countries both explicitly and implicitly. The book is full of author’s analysis of the culture, society, politics and American government.
The red thread stretching through the whole Americas systems and institutions is the passionate desire for equality. Even liberty can sometimes be sacrificed to the benefit of equality. This carving of equality has created a wide middle class, and eliminated aristocracy. It created both positive and negative consequences. A person who could become outstanding within a society divided into classes is brought down in the society which has large middle class. According to the author, American democratic revolution lasts for seven hundred years. The way liberty and democracy develop in the United States is different from how it develop in Europe. The US in an Exceptional country for which this different way of development worked. Also, Tocqueville emphasizes the difference between the American Revolution and the many European revolutions. The difference is that the US Revolution was not based on Anarchy, but on the contrary it was based on law obedience and striving for justice.
The main questions the author tries to answer are: what makes the United States different from European countries, why these points are different, and can this American experience help to build the same scale democracy in the Europe, make similar positive changes. The author reflects on these questions throughout his work.
Other important questions should be asked are: Is this course towards equality is the right way? What are other consequences of democracy except named by Tocqueville, such as: the preoccupancy with material goods, tyranny by the majority of the people over the ideas and thought. What are the side effects of this way? Are the former valuables still in value and is it possible that America came down from its previous path.
The freedom and equality are the corner stones of American Revolution. However, along with the freedoms moral rules need to be promoted, so that the people could use this freedom to their benefit, not to harm themselves and other people. The freedom can become the stumbling-block for weak minds. Thus the morality and good education is necessary. In the beginning the South part of the US was occupied primarily by the gold …