Alexis de Tocqueville

Alexis de Tocqueville was born in Paris to an aristocratic Norman family. In 1831 he traveled to the United States with Gustave de Beaumont to study prisons, and the trip produced Democracy in America (1835 and 1840), a study of how equality shapes politics, manners and religion. He sat in the Chamber of Deputies from 1839, helped draft the 1848 constitution of the Second Republic and served briefly as Minister of Foreign Affairs in 1849. After Louis Napoléon's coup of December 1851 he withdrew from public life and wrote The Old Regime and the Revolution (1856).

Tocqueville is widely read as one of the founders of comparative politics and political sociology, and Democracy in America remains a standard reference on American civic life. Admirers across traditions draw on him: liberals for his defense of free institutions and the press, conservatives for his emphasis on religion, family and local community, and communitarians for his account of civil society and associations. His idea of soft despotism is often cited in debates about the size of government. Critics point out that his portrait of America gave limited attention to slavery and the treatment of Native Americans relative to their importance, though he did condemn both. His support for the conquest and colonization of Algeria, including harsh military methods, is a major focus of later criticism. Some historians also question how far his generalizations about America rested on a short visit.