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In 1831 Alexis de Tocqueville, a young French aristocrat and ambitious civil servant, made a nine-month journey throughout America. The result was Democracy in America, a monumental study of the life and institutions of the evolving nation. Tocqueville looked to the flourishing... Read Full Overview

The first English-language edition published in 1838 and translated by Henry Reeve, Esq. with Preface and notes by John C. Spencer. This landmark work initiated a dialogue about the nature of democracy and the United States and its people that continues to this day. In 1831,... Read Full Overview

Democracy in America examines the democratic revolution Tocqueville believed had been occurring over the previous several hundred years. The primary focus of the book is an analysis of why republican representative democracy has succeeded in the United States while failing... Read Full Overview

By Alexis de Tocqueville. From America's call for a free press to its embrace of the capitalist system, Democracy in America--, first published in 1835, --enlightens, entertains, and endures as a brilliant study of our national government and character.

Democracy in America has had the singular honor of being even to this day the work that political commentators of every stripe refer to when they seek to draw large conclusions about the society of the United States. Alexis de Tocqueville, a young French aristocrat,... Read Full Overview

Abridged, with an Introduction by Patrick Renshaw. Democracy in America is a classic of political philosophy. Hailed by John Stuart Mill and Horace Greely as the finest book ever written on the nature of democracy, it continues to be an influential text on both sides of the Atlantic,... Read Full Overview

In 1831, the then twenty-seven year old Alexis de Tocqueville, was sent with Gustave de Beaumont to America by the French Government to study and make a report on the American prison system. Over a period of nine months the two traveled all over America making notes not only... Read Full Overview

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-59) came to America in 1831 to see what a great republic was like. What struck him most was the country's equality of conditions, its democracy . The book he wrote on his return to France, Democracy in America , is both the best ever written on democracy... Read Full Overview

This new edition of Democracy in America makes Tocqueville's classic nineteenth-century study of American politics, society, and culture available -- finally -- in a brief and accessible version. Designed for instructors who are eager to teach the work but reluctant to... Read Full Overview