Commercial capitalism and the democratic psyche: The threat to tocquevillean citizenship

History of Political Thought

Volumn 22, Issue 2, 2001, Pages 317-350

  Janara, L ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN ONTARIO   (Canada)

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EID: 0035626718     PISSN: 0143781X     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
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References (176)

1. See for instance M. Sandel, Democracy's Discontent: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, 1996); S. Bowles and H. Gintis, Democracy and Capitalism: Property, Community and the Contradictions of Modern Social Thought (New York, 1987); R.A. Dahl, A Preface to Economic Democracy (Berkeley, 1985); J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy (Harmondsworth, 1983);
2. See for instance M. Sandel, Democracy's Discontent: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, 1996); S. Bowles and H. Gintis, Democracy and Capitalism: Property, Community and the Contradictions of Modern Social Thought (New York, 1987); R.A. Dahl, A Preface to Economic Democracy (Berkeley, 1985); J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy (Harmondsworth, 1983);
3. See for instance M. Sandel, Democracy's Discontent: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, 1996); S. Bowles and H. Gintis, Democracy and Capitalism: Property, Community and the Contradictions of Modern Social Thought (New York, 1987); R.A. Dahl, A Preface to Economic Democracy (Berkeley, 1985); J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy (Harmondsworth, 1983);
4. See for instance M. Sandel, Democracy's Discontent: America in Search of a Public Philosophy (Cambridge, 1996); S. Bowles and H. Gintis, Democracy and Capitalism: Property, Community and the Contradictions of Modern Social Thought (New York, 1987); R.A. Dahl, A Preface to Economic Democracy (Berkeley, 1985); J. Cohen and J. Rogers, On Democracy (Harmondsworth, 1983);
5. M. Walzer, Spheres of Justice (New York, 1983);
6. C. Pateman, Participation and Democratic Theory (Cambridge, 1970).
7. Tocqueville corresponded regularly with his friend, English economist Naussau Senior, who favoured laissez-faire economies because he believed that only the desire for wealth motivated economic activity. See N.W. Senior, An Outline of the Science of Political Economy (London, 1836), and Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834 to 1859, ed. M.C.M. Simpson (London, 1872; reprinted New York, 1968). Tocqueville did not share many of Senior's views, but never provided a sustained response. For discussion see R. Boesche, The Strange Liberalism of Alexis de Tocqueville (Ithaca, NY, 1987), pp. 134-7.
8. Tocqueville corresponded regularly with his friend, English economist Naussau Senior, who favoured laissez-faire economies because he believed that only the desire for wealth motivated economic activity. See N.W. Senior, An Outline of the Science of Political Economy (London, 1836), and Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834 to 1859, ed. M.C.M. Simpson (London, 1872; reprinted New York, 1968). Tocqueville did not share many of Senior's views, but never provided a sustained response. For discussion see R. Boesche, The Strange Liberalism of Alexis de Tocqueville (Ithaca, NY, 1987), pp. 134-7.
9. Tocqueville corresponded regularly with his friend, English economist Naussau Senior, who favoured laissez-faire economies because he believed that only the desire for wealth motivated economic activity. See N.W. Senior, An Outline of the Science of Political Economy (London, 1836), and Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834 to 1859, ed. M.C.M. Simpson (London, 1872; reprinted New York, 1968). Tocqueville did not share many of Senior's views, but never provided a sustained response. For discussion see R. Boesche, The Strange Liberalism of Alexis de Tocqueville (Ithaca, NY, 1987), pp. 134-7.
10. See J. Lamberti, Tocqueville and the Two Democracies, trans. A. Goldhammer (Cambridge, MA, 1989), pp. 177-81; J.T. Schleifer, The Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America (Chapel Hill, NC, 1980), pp. 73-81; and S. Drescher, Tocqueville and England (Cambridge, MA, 1964), pp. 125-51, for discussion of Tocqueville's response to various economic theories.
11. See J. Lamberti, Tocqueville and the Two Democracies, trans. A. Goldhammer (Cambridge, MA, 1989), pp. 177-81; J.T. Schleifer, The Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America (Chapel Hill, NC, 1980), pp. 73-81; and S. Drescher, Tocqueville and England (Cambridge, MA, 1964), pp. 125-51, for discussion of Tocqueville's response to various economic theories.
12. See J. Lamberti, Tocqueville and the Two Democracies, trans. A. Goldhammer (Cambridge, MA, 1989), pp. 177-81; J.T. Schleifer, The Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America (Chapel Hill, NC, 1980), pp. 73-81; and S. Drescher, Tocqueville and England (Cambridge, MA, 1964), pp. 125-51, for discussion of Tocqueville's response to various economic theories.
13. Tocqueville wrote two 'Memoirs on Pauperism', in which he observed the transformation of the agricultural mode of production into an industrial one based in wage-labour, but these observations remained mostly detached from his political theorizing. Later, during the turmoil of the 1840s in France, Tocqueville gained more awareness of the complexity of the problem, but he continued to evade it in the Chamber of Deputies as elsewhere. See Drescher, Tocqueville and England, p. 129. In 1843 Tocqueville wrote letters that began to pay more heed to the problem of workers in capitalist industry, but imagined it would manifest itself in any serious way only far in the future. See S. Drescher, ' "Why Great Revolutions Will Become Rare": Tocqueville's Most Neglected Prognosis', Journal of Modern History, 64 (September 1992), pp. 446-7.
14. Tocqueville wrote two 'Memoirs on Pauperism', in which he observed the transformation of the agricultural mode of production into an industrial one based in wage-labour, but these observations remained mostly detached from his political theorizing. Later, during the turmoil of the 1840s in France, Tocqueville gained more awareness of the complexity of the problem, but he continued to evade it in the Chamber of Deputies as elsewhere. See Drescher, Tocqueville and England, p. 129. In 1843 Tocqueville wrote letters that began to pay more heed to the problem of workers in capitalist industry, but imagined it would manifest itself in any serious way only far in the future. See S. Drescher, ' "Why Great Revolutions Will Become Rare": Tocqueville's Most Neglected Prognosis', Journal of Modern History, 64 (September 1992), pp. 446-7.
15. Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', pp. 420-54 (especially pp. 444-9); Drescher, Tocqueville and England, especially Chs. V and VII; J. Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville (Oxford, 1965), pp. 80-5, 94-5, 217-18, 251. Drescher claims: 'If the Democracy gives short shrift to the threat posed by great industrialists, it gives none at all to the threat of industrial workers.' (Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', p. 446.) Lively writes that Tocqueville 'virtually ignored the major area of men's daily life, their work, and it is in this area above all that in present society there is the widest gap between men's activities and their control over them', p. 251. Zeitlin observes that Tocqueville's fellow Frenchman Michel Chevalier provided a far superior account of 'increasing urbanization, commercialization, and industrialization', including accounts of workers' strikes and other forms of class unrest, and the formation of unions; see I. Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution in Alexis de Tocqueville (Boston, 1971), pp. 51, 52 and passim. See also D. Satz, 'Tocqueville, Commerce and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. D. Copp, J. Hampton and J.E. Roemer (Cambridge, 1993), where she suggests that, for Tocqueville, democratic politics and capitalist industry do not combine readily, though he failed to theorize the matter.
16. Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', pp. 420-54 (especially pp. 444-9); Drescher, Tocqueville and England, especially Chs. V and VII; J. Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville (Oxford, 1965), pp. 80-5, 94-5, 217-18, 251. Drescher claims: 'If the Democracy gives short shrift to the threat posed by great industrialists, it gives none at all to the threat of industrial workers.' (Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', p. 446.) Lively writes that Tocqueville 'virtually ignored the major area of men's daily life, their work, and it is in this area above all that in present society there is the widest gap between men's activities and their control over them', p. 251. Zeitlin observes that Tocqueville's fellow Frenchman Michel Chevalier provided a far superior account of 'increasing urbanization, commercialization, and industrialization', including accounts of workers' strikes and other forms of class unrest, and the formation of unions; see I. Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution in Alexis de Tocqueville (Boston, 1971), pp. 51, 52 and passim. See also D. Satz, 'Tocqueville, Commerce and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. D. Copp, J. Hampton and J.E. Roemer (Cambridge, 1993), where she suggests that, for Tocqueville, democratic politics and capitalist industry do not combine readily, though he failed to theorize the matter.
17. Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', pp. 420-54 (especially pp. 444-9); Drescher, Tocqueville and England, especially Chs. V and VII; J. Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville (Oxford, 1965), pp. 80-5, 94-5, 217-18, 251. Drescher claims: 'If the Democracy gives short shrift to the threat posed by great industrialists, it gives none at all to the threat of industrial workers.' (Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', p. 446.) Lively writes that Tocqueville 'virtually ignored the major area of men's daily life, their work, and it is in this area above all that in present society there is the widest gap between men's activities and their control over them', p. 251. Zeitlin observes that Tocqueville's fellow Frenchman Michel Chevalier provided a far superior account of 'increasing urbanization, commercialization, and industrialization', including accounts of workers' strikes and other forms of class unrest, and the formation of unions; see I. Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution in Alexis de Tocqueville (Boston, 1971), pp. 51, 52 and passim. See also D. Satz, 'Tocqueville, Commerce and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. D. Copp, J. Hampton and J.E. Roemer (Cambridge, 1993), where she suggests that, for Tocqueville, democratic politics and capitalist industry do not combine readily, though he failed to theorize the matter.
18. Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', pp. 420-54 (especially pp. 444-9); Drescher, Tocqueville and England, especially Chs. V and VII; J. Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville (Oxford, 1965), pp. 80-5, 94-5, 217-18, 251. Drescher claims: 'If the Democracy gives short shrift to the threat posed by great industrialists, it gives none at all to the threat of industrial workers.' (Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', p. 446.) Lively writes that Tocqueville 'virtually ignored the major area of men's daily life, their work, and it is in this area above all that in present society there is the widest gap between men's activities and their control over them', p. 251. Zeitlin observes that Tocqueville's fellow Frenchman Michel Chevalier provided a far superior account of 'increasing urbanization, commercialization, and industrialization', including accounts of workers' strikes and other forms of class unrest, and the formation of unions; see I. Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution in Alexis de Tocqueville (Boston, 1971), pp. 51, 52 and passim. See also D. Satz, 'Tocqueville, Commerce and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. D. Copp, J. Hampton and J.E. Roemer (Cambridge, 1993), where she suggests that, for Tocqueville, democratic politics and capitalist industry do not combine readily, though he failed to theorize the matter.
19. Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', pp. 420-54 (especially pp. 444-9); Drescher, Tocqueville and England, especially Chs. V and VII; J. Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville (Oxford, 1965), pp. 80-5, 94-5, 217-18, 251. Drescher claims: 'If the Democracy gives short shrift to the threat posed by great industrialists, it gives none at all to the threat of industrial workers.' (Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', p. 446.) Lively writes that Tocqueville 'virtually ignored the major area of men's daily life, their work, and it is in this area above all that in present society there is the widest gap between men's activities and their control over them', p. 251. Zeitlin observes that Tocqueville's fellow Frenchman Michel Chevalier provided a far superior account of 'increasing urbanization, commercialization, and industrialization', including accounts of workers' strikes and other forms of class unrest, and the formation of unions; see I. Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution in Alexis de Tocqueville (Boston, 1971), pp. 51, 52 and passim. See also D. Satz, 'Tocqueville, Commerce and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. D. Copp, J. Hampton and J.E. Roemer (Cambridge, 1993), where she suggests that, for Tocqueville, democratic politics and capitalist industry do not combine readily, though he failed to theorize the matter.
20. Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', pp. 420-54 (especially pp. 444-9); Drescher, Tocqueville and England, especially Chs. V and VII; J. Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville (Oxford, 1965), pp. 80-5, 94-5, 217-18, 251. Drescher claims: 'If the Democracy gives short shrift to the threat posed by great industrialists, it gives none at all to the threat of industrial workers.' (Drescher, 'Great Revolutions', p. 446.) Lively writes that Tocqueville 'virtually ignored the major area of men's daily life, their work, and it is in this area above all that in present society there is the widest gap between men's activities and their control over them', p. 251. Zeitlin observes that Tocqueville's fellow Frenchman Michel Chevalier provided a far superior account of 'increasing urbanization, commercialization, and industrialization', including accounts of workers' strikes and other forms of class unrest, and the formation of unions; see I. Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution in Alexis de Tocqueville (Boston, 1971), pp. 51, 52 and passim. See also D. Satz, 'Tocqueville, Commerce and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. D. Copp, J. Hampton and J.E. Roemer (Cambridge, 1993), where she suggests that, for Tocqueville, democratic politics and capitalist industry do not combine readily, though he failed to theorize the matter.
21. S. Holmes, 'Tocqueville and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. Copp, Hampton and Roemer, p. 44. Despite his aristocratic impulses, Holmes argues, Tocqueville refuses to 'stigmatize economic life as a sphere of meaningless drudgery from which individuals must be heroically rescued by democratic politics'. Industry promotes mobility to soften social cleavages, and generally serves democratic politics by instilling a desire for social tranquillity in the face of the turmoil, factionalism and 'thoughts of revolution' that can dog democratic politics (ibid., pp. 40, 41). This 'happy coexistence of public and private spheres', writes Holmes, is 'precisely what Tocqueville found in the United States', and Holmes contends that 'for Tocqueville', American democracy 'guarantees coincidence of the interests of the governors and the governed' and the American is 'an economicopolitical man', p. 42.
22. S. Holmes, 'Tocqueville and Democracy', in The Idea of Democracy, ed. Copp, Hampton and Roemer, p. 44. Despite his aristocratic impulses, Holmes argues, Tocqueville refuses to 'stigmatize economic life as a sphere of meaningless drudgery from which individuals must be heroically rescued by democratic politics'. Industry promotes mobility to soften social cleavages, and generally serves democratic politics by instilling a desire for social tranquillity in the face of the turmoil, factionalism and 'thoughts of revolution' that can dog democratic politics (ibid., pp. 40, 41). This 'happy coexistence of public and private spheres', writes Holmes, is 'precisely what Tocqueville found in the United States', and Holmes contends that 'for Tocqueville', American democracy 'guarantees coincidence of the interests of the governors and the governed' and the American is 'an economicopolitical man', p. 42.
23. M. Reinhardt, The Art of Being Free: Taking Liberties with Tocqueville, Marx and Arendt (Ithaca, NY, 1997), p. 20.
24. Schleifer, Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America, pp. 73-84. Schleifer reports Tocqueville's uncertainty about how to fit his limited observations about industrialization into an early draft of Democracy in America's first volumes. He had labelled some fragments 'various and important notes . . . which I do not know where to place' and included among these are some 'on the influence of manufacturing on democratic liberty'. But as Schleifer notes, 'for some unknown reason, Tocqueville decided against developing and including this concept in the first part of his work; and only these tantalizing hints of what-might-have-been can be found in his drafts and his working manuscript' (ibid., pp. 80-1).
25. Schleifer, Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America, pp. 73-84. Schleifer reports Tocqueville's uncertainty about how to fit his limited observations about industrialization into an early draft of Democracy in America's first volumes. He had labelled some fragments 'various and important notes . . . which I do not know where to place' and included among these are some 'on the influence of manufacturing on democratic liberty'. But as Schleifer notes, 'for some unknown reason, Tocqueville decided against developing and including this concept in the first part of his work; and only these tantalizing hints of what-might-have-been can be found in his drafts and his working manuscript' (ibid., pp. 80-1).
26. Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 136 (see also pp. 133-40); R. Boesche, 'Why Did Tocqueville Fear Abundance? or the Tension Between Commerce and Citizenship', History of European Ideas, 9 (1) (1988), pp. 25-45.
27. Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 136 (see also pp. 133-40); R. Boesche, 'Why Did Tocqueville Fear Abundance? or the Tension Between Commerce and Citizenship', History of European Ideas, 9 (1) (1988), pp. 25-45.
28. Lamberti, Two Democracies, pp. 176-83.
29. With the exception of class cleavages constituted by 'race' relations of the day. See L. Janara, 'Fear of Falling: Tocqueville and Beaumont on US Genealogy, Democracy and Racism', submitted.
30. A. Tocqueville, Democracy in America, ed. J.P. Mayer, trans. G. Lawrence (New York, 1966; reprinted New York, 1969), p. 12 (page citations are from the 1969 edition).
31. Boesche attributes this rise in personal ambition to the fact that, for Tocqueville, democracy 'meant the rise of the middle class to political and economic power', and that the middle class's guiding ethic was acquisitive. See Boesche, 'Why Did Tocqueville Fear Abundance?', p. 26. But in Tocqueville's passages on materialism and property attitudes in Democracy in America, he tends more to attribute the rise in personal ambition to democracy and equality, as the dissolution of the fixed stations and their securities once ascribed by aristocracy. Historically this goes hand in hand with the rise of the middle class and its economic power, but as Zeitlin argues, for Tocqueville, 'it is equality that engenders a taste for well-being which, in turn, encourages trade and industry' (Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution, p. 33). Noting that Tocqueville defines 'democracy' in competing and sometimes tension-filled ways, Boesche focuses on Tocqueville's occasional tendency nearly to equate 'democracy' with middle-class rule. But the corollary of such an interpretation is the following analytical conundrum: for Tocqueville democracy and middle-class rule are basically the same; but the acquisitiveness and individualism of the middle class are the consequence not of democracy and equality, but of the rise of capitalism. The present article focuses instead on Tocqueville's prevalent vision of democracy as infused with two sets of potentialities: with dangerous tendencies that can lead to the triumph of materialism and individualism, and with healthy potentiality for active republican self-rule that eschews these former dangerous drives (though without ever comfortably erasing their potential to rear their heads). Here we encounter a conception of democracy unfamiliar to we contemporaries who tend to valorize democracy in absolute positive terms. In this alternative Tocquevillean conception, some of democracy's post-aristocratic tendencies themselves encourage and enable the entrenchment of commercialism and its acquisitive ethic, while others posit political liberty as a healthy alternative.
32. Boesche attributes this rise in personal ambition to the fact that, for Tocqueville, democracy 'meant the rise of the middle class to political and economic power', and that the middle class's guiding ethic was acquisitive. See Boesche, 'Why Did Tocqueville Fear Abundance?', p. 26. But in Tocqueville's passages on materialism and property attitudes in Democracy in America, he tends more to attribute the rise in personal ambition to democracy and equality, as the dissolution of the fixed stations and their securities once ascribed by aristocracy. Historically this goes hand in hand with the rise of the middle class and its economic power, but as Zeitlin argues, for Tocqueville, 'it is equality that engenders a taste for well-being which, in turn, encourages trade and industry' (Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution, p. 33). Noting that Tocqueville defines 'democracy' in competing and sometimes tension-filled ways, Boesche focuses on Tocqueville's occasional tendency nearly to equate 'democracy' with middle-class rule. But the corollary of such an interpretation is the following analytical conundrum: for Tocqueville democracy and middle-class rule are basically the same; but the acquisitiveness and individualism of the middle class are the consequence not of democracy and equality, but of the rise of capitalism. The present article focuses instead on Tocqueville's prevalent vision of democracy as infused with two sets of potentialities: with dangerous tendencies that can lead to the triumph of materialism and individualism, and with healthy potentiality for active republican self-rule that eschews these former dangerous drives (though without ever comfortably erasing their potential to rear their heads). Here we encounter a conception of democracy unfamiliar to we contemporaries who tend to valorize democracy in absolute positive terms. In this alternative Tocquevillean conception, some of democracy's post-aristocratic tendencies themselves encourage and enable the entrenchment of commercialism and its acquisitive ethic, while others posit political liberty as a healthy alternative.
33. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 551.
34. Ibid., p. 684.
35. J.S. Mill misses this dimension of Tocqueville's account when, in his 1840 review of Democracy in America, he complains that Tocqueville conflates democracy with commercialism or, as Mill puts it, he has 'bound up in one abstract idea the whole of the tendencies of modern commercial society, and given them one name -Democracy'.
36. J.S. Mill, 'M. de Tocqueville on Democracy in America', Dissertations and Discussions: Political, Philosophical and Historical (New York, 1874), p. 141.
37. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 244.
38. I use the masculine pronoun alone here because Tocqueville's portrait of individualism in nineteenth-century democracy especially refers to males, while he associates females predominantly with mores and morality. Further, to be gender-neutral would be to ignore the historical exclusion of females from full political and social rights.
39. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 506.
40. Ibid, p. 507.
41. Ibid., p. 57.
42. Ibid., pp. 692, 693.
43. Ibid., p. 593. Tocqueville says: 'I doubt if one can cite a single example of any people engaged in both manufacture and trade, from the men of Tyre to the Florentines and the English, who were not a free people.' This point is isolated; as Boesche notes, it is difficult to cite a single example where Tocqueville repeats it. Perhaps Tocqueville would have more accurately reflected his sentiments by writing that industry can teach association, when organized in non-oligarchical ways. See Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 134.
44. Ibid., p. 593. Tocqueville says: 'I doubt if one can cite a single example of any people engaged in both manufacture and trade, from the men of Tyre to the Florentines and the English, who were not a free people.' This point is isolated; as Boesche notes, it is difficult to cite a single example where Tocqueville repeats it. Perhaps Tocqueville would have more accurately reflected his sentiments by writing that industry can teach association, when organized in non-oligarchical ways. See Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 134.
45. Tocqueville, Democracy, pp. 539, 244.
46. Tocqueville observes: 'To clear, cultivate, and transform the huge uninhabited continent which is their domain, the Americans need the everyday support of an energetic passion.' While the Europeans 'habitually regard a restless spirit, immoderate desire for wealth, and an extreme love of independence as great social dangers', it is 'precisely those things' which 'assure a long and peaceful future for the American republics. Without such restless passions the population would be concentrated around a few places and would soon experience, as we do, needs which are hard to satisfy'. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 284.
47. As Satz suggests in her response to Holmes, while Tocqueville sees some interdependence between industry, commerce and democratic politics, he also 'worries that the spheres can come violently into conflict' and they can 'produce opposing social psychologies' (Satz, 'Tocqueville', p. 64).
48. Tocqueville self-consciously described himself as between aristocracy and democracy 'so my instinct could lead me blindly neither toward one nor toward the other'. Letter to Henry Reeve, 22 March 1837, in Alexis de Tocqueville: Selected Letters on Politics and Society, ed. R. Boesche, trans. J. Toupin and R. Boesche (Berkeley, 1985), pp. 115-16.
49. This is a complex psychological strategy, explored in Sigmund Freud's account of the death wish that, for him, lurks at the base of human enterprise. See Brown's deployment of Freud's theory and Martin Luther's early modern vision of the restless drive to engage in economic activity and acquire money, in N.O. Brown, Life Against Death: The Psychoanalytical Meaning of History (Middletown, CT, 1959); and Dinnerstein's contribution to these theories, which also draws on the works of Simone de Beauvoir and Lewis Mumford, in D. Dinnerstein, The Mermaid and the Minotaur: Sexual Arrangements and Human Malaise (New York, 1976).
50. This is a complex psychological strategy, explored in Sigmund Freud's account of the death wish that, for him, lurks at the base of human enterprise. See Brown's deployment of Freud's theory and Martin Luther's early modern vision of the restless drive to engage in economic activity and acquire money, in N.O. Brown, Life Against Death: The Psychoanalytical Meaning of History (Middletown, CT, 1959); and Dinnerstein's contribution to these theories, which also draws on the works of Simone de Beauvoir and Lewis Mumford, in D. Dinnerstein, The Mermaid and the Minotaur: Sexual Arrangements and Human Malaise (New York, 1976).
51. Tocqueville, Democracy, pp. 530, 531.
52. Ibid., p. 531.
53. Ibid., pp. 57, 503, 504.
54. Ibid., pp. 537-8.
55. Ibid., p. 538.
56. Ibid.
57. Ibid. This dynamic is deepened by democratic society's inclination to promote sameness among people. 'When men are more or less equal and are following the same path', they are up against 'the competition of all'. 'When all prerogatives of birth and fortune are abolished, when all professions are open to all and a man's own energies may bring him to the top of any of them, an ambitious man may think it easy to launch on a great career and feel that he is called to no common destiny. But that is a delusion which experience quickly corrects.' ( Ibid., p. 537.)
58. Ibid. This dynamic is deepened by democratic society's inclination to promote sameness among people. 'When men are more or less equal and are following the same path', they are up against 'the competition of all'. 'When all prerogatives of birth and fortune are abolished, when all professions are open to all and a man's own energies may bring him to the top of any of them, an ambitious man may think it easy to launch on a great career and feel that he is called to no common destiny. But that is a delusion which experience quickly corrects.' ( Ibid., p. 537.)
59. Ibid., p. 536.
60. Ibid., pp. 536, 537.
61. Ibid., pp. 532, 533.
62. Ibid., pp. 520, 521. Tocqueville writes: 'Men chance to have a common interest in a certain matter. It may be a trading enterprise to direct or an industrial undertaking to bring to fruition; those concerned meet and combine; little by little in this way they get used to the idea of association. The more there are of these little business concerns in common, the more do men, without conscious effort, acquire a capacity to pursue great aims in common.'
63. Ibid., p. 522.
64. Ibid., p. 198.
65. Ibid., p. 537.
66. Ibid., p. 534. 'A man who has set his heart on nothing but the good things of this world is always in a hurry, for he has only a limited time in which to find them, get them, and enjoy them. Remembrance of the shortness of life continually goads him on.' ( Ibid., pp. 536-7.)
67. Ibid., p. 534. 'A man who has set his heart on nothing but the good things of this world is always in a hurry, for he has only a limited time in which to find them, get them, and enjoy them. Remembrance of the shortness of life continually goads him on.' ( Ibid., pp. 536-7.)
68. Ibid., p. 537.
69. Ibid., p. 534. Even if these people want to organize for purposes of money-making, it is 'delusional to suppose that the spirit of association, if suppressed in one place, will nevertheless display the same vigor in all other directions', and 'to leave them entire liberty to combine in matters of trade will be in vain', pp. 522, 523.
70. Ibid., p. 616.
71. Ibid., pp. 616, 617.
72. Ibid., pp. 618, 619.
73. Ibid., p. 619. See H. Mitchell, Individual Choice and the Structures of History: Alexis de Tocqueville as Historian Reappraised (Cambridge, 1996), p. 171.
74. Ibid., p. 619. See H. Mitchell, Individual Choice and the Structures of History: Alexis de Tocqueville as Historian Reappraised (Cambridge, 1996), p. 171.
75. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 621. Tocqueville says that this code of honour is a product of the democratic idea of equality, its impulses towards materialism and individualism, desire for individual freedoms once known in England, and the physical attributes of North America, which beg cultivation.
76. Ibid., p. 621.
77. Ibid., pp. 622-3. Consider also Tocqueville's comparison of European and American navigation of the seas, ibid., pp. 402-3.
78. Ibid., pp. 622-3. Consider also Tocqueville's comparison of European and American navigation of the seas, ibid., pp. 402-3.
79. Ibid., pp. 621-2.
80. Ibid., p. 285.
81. Ibid., p. 637.
82. Ibid., p. 622.
83. Ibid., p. 291.
84. Ibid., p. 601. There were exceptions to this, of course, but here Tocqueville captures the governing bourgeois sensibilities of the day in the United States.
85. For elaboration, see L. Janara, Democracy Growing Up: Authority, Autonomy and Passion in Tocqueville's Democracy in America, Ch. 6 (forthcoming). See R.M. Smith, Civic Ideals: Conflicting Visions of Citizenship in US History (New Haven, CT, 1997), for a historical account of the political traditions that have informed practices governing who was granted citizenship in the US.
86. For elaboration, see L. Janara, Democracy Growing Up: Authority, Autonomy and Passion in Tocqueville's Democracy in America, Ch. 6 (forthcoming). See R.M. Smith, Civic Ideals: Conflicting Visions of Citizenship in US History (New Haven, CT, 1997), for a historical account of the political traditions that have informed practices governing who was granted citizenship in the US.
87. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 541.
88. Ibid.
89. Ibid., p. 14.
90. Ibid., p. 527.
91. Ibid., p. 517. See also pp. 522, 511.
92. Ibid., p. 521.
93. Ibid., pp. 622-3.
94. Ibid., p. 637.
95. E. Pessen, Jacksonian America: Society, Personality and Politics (Homewood, IL, 1969), p. 96.
96. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 541.
97. Ibid., p. 54.
98. Ibid., p. 688.
99. Ibid., p. 689.
100. Ibid., p. 444, emphasis added.
101. Ibid., p. 533.
102. Ibid., p. 635.
103. Ibid., p. 541.
104. Ibid., p. 636.
105. Ibid.
106. Ibid.
107. Ibid.
108. Ibid., p. 540.
109. Ibid., p. 636.
110. Ibid., p. 644.
111. 'In no other country in the world is the love of property keener or more alert than in the United States, and nowhere else does the majority display less inclination toward doctrines which in any way threaten the way property is owned.' Ibid., pp. 638-9.
112. Ibid., p. 645.
113. Ibid.
114. Pessen, Jacksonian America, p. 94.
115. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 555.
116. Ibid., pp. 557-8.
117. Ibid., p. 403.
118. Ibid., p. 555.
119. Ibid.
120. Ibid, p. 556.
121. Ibid., p. 557.
122. Ibid., p. 556.
123. Ibid., p. 701.
124. Ibid., p. 556.
125. Ibid.
126. Of the factories he observed during his 1835 trip to Manchester, Tocqueville writes: 'here is the slave, there the master; there the wealth of some, here the poverty of most; there the organised effort of thousands produce, to the profit of one man, what society has not yet learnt to give. Here the weakness of the individual seems more feeble and helpless even than in the middle of a wilderness; here the effects, there the causes'. Tocqueville, Journeys to England and Ireland, ed. J.P. Mayer, trans. G. Lawrence and J.P. Mayer (London, 1957), p. 107.
127. Tocqueville, Democracy, pp. 556-7.
128. Ibid., pp. 558, 557.
129. Ibid., p. 557.
130. Ibid.
131. Ibid., p. 573.
132. Special thanks to Mary G. Dietz for drawing my close attention to this chapter.
133. Ibid., p. 573, including footnote.
134. Ibid., pp. 574-5.
135. Ibid.
136. Ibid., p. 575.
137. Tocqueville does not suggest that the United States, or France for that matter, exhibits a strict equality, socially, politically or economically. Rather, when he speaks of 'equality of conditions' he refers to the relatively levelled social, political and economic conditions that he witnesses in the US and France in the wake of aristocracy. He is interested in how this transition shifts mental disposition; how the new world of democracy 'creates opinions, gives birth to feelings, suggests customs, and modifies whatever it does not create', ibid., p. 9.
138. Ibid.,p. 576.
139. Ibid.
140. Ibid., pp. 574, 577.
141. Ibid., p. 578.
142. Ibid.
143. Ibid., p. 579.
144. Ibid., p. 573.
145. Ibid., p. 577, emphasis added.
146. Ibid., emphasis added.
147. Ibid., p. 566.
148. Ibid., p. 577. This analysis of the ideology of contract shares an overarching sensibility with the feminist critique of contractarian liberalism, including C. Pateman's The Disorder of Women: Democracy, Feminism and Political Theory (Stanford, 1989).
149. Tocqueville, Democracy, pp. 579, 582.
150. Ibid., pp. 579-80.
151. See Mitchell, Individual Choice, pp. 173-4, for a similar reading of Tocqueville on master-servant relations.
152. Tocqueville remarks repeatedly that the changes that a social state undergoes in the transition from aristocracy to democracy are seen in family relations and elsewhere, not just in narrowly defined political relations. His point is that the entire social state bears the mark of the transition. See Tocqueville, Democracy, pp. 399, 585, 586, 589.
153. Mitchell, Individual Choice, p. 175.
154. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 582.
155. Ibid., p. 583.
156. Ibid., p. 584.
157. Ibid.
158. Ibid., pp. 557-8.
159. All that seems to remain is an intellectual class, but in early twenty-first-century capitalism, universities and colleges are increasingly falling under the auspices of the logic of capital so that intellectuals dedicated to the critique of it are permitted less and less space to do their work. Boesche observes that in his response to Machiavelli's history of Florence, Tocqueville goes so far as to predict that democracy will fail in large industrial cities like Manchester, and will fail throughout a nation if such industrial cities dominate (Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 137). However, Tocqueville also maintained a pre-capitalist understanding of poverty as endemic to society, and a belief that charity and mutual aid societies are the appropriate response. Thank you to an anonymous journal reviewer for improving my grasp of these points. See Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution, pp. 39-40, 90-4; Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 135.
160. All that seems to remain is an intellectual class, but in early twenty-first-century capitalism, universities and colleges are increasingly falling under the auspices of the logic of capital so that intellectuals dedicated to the critique of it are permitted less and less space to do their work. Boesche observes that in his response to Machiavelli's history of Florence, Tocqueville goes so far as to predict that democracy will fail in large industrial cities like Manchester, and will fail throughout a nation if such industrial cities dominate (Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 137). However, Tocqueville also maintained a pre-capitalist understanding of poverty as endemic to society, and a belief that charity and mutual aid societies are the appropriate response. Thank you to an anonymous journal reviewer for improving my grasp of these points. See Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution, pp. 39-40, 90-4; Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 135.
161. All that seems to remain is an intellectual class, but in early twenty-first-century capitalism, universities and colleges are increasingly falling under the auspices of the logic of capital so that intellectuals dedicated to the critique of it are permitted less and less space to do their work. Boesche observes that in his response to Machiavelli's history of Florence, Tocqueville goes so far as to predict that democracy will fail in large industrial cities like Manchester, and will fail throughout a nation if such industrial cities dominate (Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 137). However, Tocqueville also maintained a pre-capitalist understanding of poverty as endemic to society, and a belief that charity and mutual aid societies are the appropriate response. Thank you to an anonymous journal reviewer for improving my grasp of these points. See Zeitlin, Liberty, Equality and Revolution, pp. 39-40, 90-4; Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 135.
162. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 684.
163. R. Boesche, Theories of Tyranny from Plato to Arendt (University Park, PA, 1996), p. 224.
164. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 686.
165. Ibid., p. 687.
166. Thank you to an anonymous journal reviewer and lain Hampsher-Monk for the observation that, in Tocqueville's account, the state exercises autonomy from the industrialist class. Certainly Tocqueville's dominant concern in the second volume of Democracy in America is state despotism, not reign by capitalists.
167. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 686. Tocqueville writes elsewhere that if citizens 'are only allowed to associate for trivial purposes, they will have neither the will nor the power to do so', ibid., p. 523. As Schleifer notes, however, 'the complex relationship between private associations and government' received 'very little attention' in Democracy in America. But Schleifer also reports that Tocqueville wrote a draft chapter entitled 'On the Manner in which the American Governments Act toward Associations' for the 1840 volumes, but omitted it 'because it very briefly and very incompletely treats a very interesting subject which has been treated at length by others, among them Chevalier'. Tocqueville quoted in Schleifer, Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America, p. 82.
168. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 686. Tocqueville writes elsewhere that if citizens 'are only allowed to associate for trivial purposes, they will have neither the will nor the power to do so', ibid., p. 523. As Schleifer notes, however, 'the complex relationship between private associations and government' received 'very little attention' in Democracy in America. But Schleifer also reports that Tocqueville wrote a draft chapter entitled 'On the Manner in which the American Governments Act toward Associations' for the 1840 volumes, but omitted it 'because it very briefly and very incompletely treats a very interesting subject which has been treated at length by others, among them Chevalier'. Tocqueville quoted in Schleifer, Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America, p. 82.
169. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 686. Tocqueville writes elsewhere that if citizens 'are only allowed to associate for trivial purposes, they will have neither the will nor the power to do so', ibid., p. 523. As Schleifer notes, however, 'the complex relationship between private associations and government' received 'very little attention' in Democracy in America. But Schleifer also reports that Tocqueville wrote a draft chapter entitled 'On the Manner in which the American Governments Act toward Associations' for the 1840 volumes, but omitted it 'because it very briefly and very incompletely treats a very interesting subject which has been treated at length by others, among them Chevalier'. Tocqueville quoted in Schleifer, Making of Tocqueville's Democracy in America, p. 82.
170. Tocqueville, Democracy, p. 677.
171. Ibid., p. 682.
172. Ibid., p. 671.
173. Ibid., p. 540.
174. Ibid., p. 541.
175. Accordingly, he once praised the small-scale quasi-cooperative village industries he saw in Switzerland. Boesche cites Tocqueville's remark that '[t]he political and moral advantages of this kind of manufacture seem evident; but the example of England seemed to prove that, with respect to economy (which is everything in commerce), this system was defective. Nonetheless we have just seen that the Swiss were competing against England and France . . .' (Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 137). Boesche also notes that in The Ancien Régime, Tocqueville praised medieval modes of holding property in common in decentralized communities. Boesche asks leadingly, 'what kind of economy could Tocqueville envision as being consistent with his love of decentralization . . . ?' (ibid., p. 134).
176. Accordingly, he once praised the small-scale quasi-cooperative village industries he saw in Switzerland. Boesche cites Tocqueville's remark that '[t]he political and moral advantages of this kind of manufacture seem evident; but the example of England seemed to prove that, with respect to economy (which is everything in commerce), this system was defective. Nonetheless we have just seen that the Swiss were competing against England and France . . .' (Boesche, Strange Liberalism, p. 137). Boesche also notes that in The Ancien Régime, Tocqueville praised medieval modes of holding property in common in decentralized communities. Boesche asks leadingly, 'what kind of economy could Tocqueville envision as being consistent with his love of decentralization . . . ?' (ibid., p. 134).