Books by Alexis de Tocqueville
Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) was a French politician from an aristocratic family who wrote incredibly influential books about democracy and the causes of the French Revolution. Despite liberal leanings, more than ten members of Tocqueville’s extended family were executed during the Terror, including his great-grandfather, Guillaume-Chrétien de Lamoignon de Malesherbes. Tocqueville travelled extensively, not only to the United States but also to England, Ireland and North Africa. A recent prizewinning biography about Tocqueville is The Man Who Understood Democracy: The Life of Alexis de Tocqueville (2022) by Olivier Zunz, a Tocqueville scholar at the University of Virginia. Coming out in 2023 is a book that focuses on his travels, Travels with Tocqueville Beyond America, by political theorist Jeremy Jennings.
“Tocqueville, in a way, was the first sociologist, though that field didn’t exist in the 1830s, when he wrote the book. In it, he looks at the formal institutions of American democracy—Congress, and the presidency, and so forth—but what everybody really takes away from it is that those institutions ride on top of the morals and mores and habits of the underlying society…Tocqueville gives you a different analysis that looks beneath the surface of the visible institutions and tries to understand the moral habits that underlie the workings of those institutions. It’s really looking at the society rather than just the formal laws and whatnot.” Read more...
The best books on Liberal Democracy
Francis Fukuyama, Political Scientist
“What’s striking is that he is able to develop broad analytical categories that relate the French Revolution to the direction of modern society as a whole, which he sees as the destruction of the aristocracy and the coming of democracy. But he adds a twist that will remain influential to this day, which is that he points to the weakness of democracy as a form of government. It has an internal, inherent tendency to lead to despotism unless there are certain conditions that prevent that from happening.” Read more...
The best books on The French Revolution
Lynn Hunt, Historian
Interviews where books by Alexis de Tocqueville were recommended
The best books on The French Revolution, recommended by Lynn Hunt
It’s a revolution that still resonates and yet it resists easy interpretation. Lynn Hunt, a leading historian of the French Revolution, tells us what the events of 1789 and later years really meant, and what relevance they have for us today.
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1
The Spirit of Democracy: The Struggle to Build Free Societies Throughout the World
by Larry Diamond -
2
Ill Winds: Saving Democracy from Russian Rage, Chinese Ambition, and American Complacency
by Larry Diamond -
3
How Democracies Die: What History Reveals About Our Future
by Daniel Ziblatt & Steven Levitsky -
4
Polyarchy: Participation and Opposition
by Robert Dahl -
5
Democracy in America
by Alexis de Tocqueville
The best books on Liberal Democracy, recommended by Francis Fukuyama
The best books on Liberal Democracy, recommended by Francis Fukuyama
Even some of the world’s most authoritarian rulers continue to pay lip service to democracy and people’s right to vote for their leaders, but the days when many social scientists believed that all countries at a certain level of prosperity would eventually turn to liberal democracy are over, says Francis Fukuyama, now a Senior Fellow at Stanford University’s Freeman Spogli Institute. Here, he recommends books to better understand liberal democracy, and what those of us lucky enough to live in one can do to protect our form of government.
Stephen Breyer on his Intellectual Influences
US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer talks about the books that have influenced his thinking and explains why reading widely, including literature, is essential for judges and lawyers.
The best books on Compassionate Conservatism, recommended by Karl Rove
Karl Rove recommends five historical works that define, for him, the essence of American Conservatism.
The best books on Saving Capitalism and Democracy, recommended by Robert Reich
It’s not the first period in history that American society has suffered from a crisis of inequality. Former labour secretary, Robert Reich, recommends books to help us understand the response of previous generations to the same kinds of challenges we now face.
The best books on Freedom Isn’t Enough, recommended by Yuval Levin
The Founder and Editor of National Affairs Magazine speculates how the founding fathers of Conservatism might have been nervous about Sarah Palin and the Tea Party movement
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History of the French Revolution
by Jules Michelet -
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The French Revolution
by Hippolyte Taine -
3
Democracy in America
by Alexis de Tocqueville -
4
Reflections on the Revolution in France
by Edmund Burke -
5
The Complete Essays of Montaigne
Michel de Montaigne (trans. by Donald M. Frame) -
6
The Prince
by Niccolo Machiavelli
The best books on The French Revolution, recommended by Peregrine Worsthorne
The best books on The French Revolution, recommended by Peregrine Worsthorne
For anybody wanting to go into politics a mastery of the French Revolution is an enormous help and a knowledge of history essential, says Peregrine Worsthorne, the columnist and former editor of Britain’s Sunday Telegraph. He recommends the best books on the French Revolution, both for and against.
