Toukvi was a landowner seineur in normandy. He went with his peasant farmers to the polling station. And he says, i didn't put myself at the head because this is n now democracy. They were in elf bedgl order. But we did get to this grassy knoll, and i felt that i had to make a them. So i gave a speech, and i said, younow, when you get to the town to vote, make sure you vote for us and go to the pub later. We get democratic despotism in france. Susansusan me what er lessons were therefor the larger europe in this book? Well
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859) and his examination of the American democratic system. He wrote De La Démocratie en Amérique in two parts, published in 1835 and 1840, when France was ruled by the July Monarchy of Louis-Philippe. Tocqueville was interested in how aspects of American democracy, in the age of President Andrew Jackson, could be applied to Europe as it moved away from rule by monarchs and aristocrats. His work has been revisited by politicians ever since, particularly in America, with its analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of direct democracy and its warnings of mediocrity and the tyranny of the majority.
With
Robert Gildea
Professor of Modern History at the University of Oxford
Susan-Mary Grant
Professor of American History at Newcastle University
and
Jeremy Jennings
Professor of Political Theory and Head of the School of Politics & Economics at King's College London
Producer: Simon Tillotson.