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by: Alexis de Tocqueville
Amazon.com's Price: $7.95 Prices subject to change. Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 320.973
EAN: 9780451528124
ISBN: 0451528123
Label: Signet Classics
Manufacturer: Signet Classics
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 320
Publication Date: September 01, 2001
Publisher: Signet Classics
Release Date: September 05, 2001
Sales Rank: 72398
Studio: Signet Classics
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
In the mid-1800s, a French political scientist named Alexis de Tocqueville came to the United States to appraise the meaning and functioning of democracy. This extraordinary book, written as a result of his visit, contains his comments and criticisms-many of which are still vital in today's world-and is a must-read for anyone interested in American politics.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - A Classic Treatise on America
Alexis de Tocqueville came to America for nine months in 1831-32 to conduct a study of the American penal system. What resulted instead was "Democracy in America", one of the best-ever treatises on a nation's politics, culture, and institutions.
This Bantam edition begins with a great introduction by Joseph Epstein.
Along with his famous words concerning the tyranny of the majority, the rise (and future clash) of America and Russia, and the differences between democratic ... Read More
Rating: - Prophetic Reflections on the Affects of Democracy and Equality
Before approaching the text of Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America, I had little realization as to the proper content of his prophetic work. To my former understanding, the text was merely a collection of adulation and reflections upon the American way of life by a French observer in the nineteenth century. Upon reading this abridged version of Democracy in America, I found a much more prophetic text which reflected more upon the cultural impact of democratic institutions than upon the praise ... Read More
Rating:  - abridgement should not equate inquisition
As a former reviewer has stated this edition takes quite a bit of liberty in excising the less flattering aspects of Tocqueville's views of America. In fact the entire section on race-relations has been excised --perhaps it was deemed too controversial? This kind of editing is even more unacceptable in our age of open communications and hopefully open minds. Find another edition.
Rating: - Find another edition.
I have three complaints about this edition of Tocqueville:
1) Nowhere in the book is the translator credited. This violates basic principles of publication and scholarship.
2) This is in fact an abridged version of the original English-language translation by Henry Reeve, dating from sometime before 1862. Unless you want to re-create the experience of a modern Frenchman confronted with de Tocqueville's somewhat archaic French by reading the text in somewhat archaic English, I would seek out ... Read More
Rating: - Preaching to the Choir
Praising this book is a bit like saying Huckleberry Finn was one of the great American novels - it's a profound statement of the obvious. Even so, it must be said: Alexis de Tocqueville's magnum opus is a brilliant sociological analysis of America, with his genius made all the more evident by how applicable his observations about 1830s America are to its twenty-first century counterpart. Everything from the solidity of America's political infrastructure to the disquieting trend toward anti-intellectualism ... Read More
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