Thoughts, Ideas and other Snippets from Tocqueville's Democracy in America, Volume I
Been a while since I’ve written one of these… Mostly been busy writing about perspective for the New Philosopher competition (without realising that the subject was perception… but never mind…) All is still fine, seeing people every so often and the end is slowly coming into sight for the lockdown, which is exciting.
Review of the Week
In an effort to read more chunky primary source style books, I went in big with Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville. Having been described by David Runciman (from the excellent podcast Talking Politics) as one of the best books ever written about democracy and one of the best ever written about America, I expected this to be interesting but dry, and so far it has lived up to expectations. At about 870 pages long I wanted to split it into two reviews, with the split matching the two published volumes in 1835 and 1840.
The book is about the structure of American society as found by Alexis de Tocqueville, a French civil servant, who travelled America for 9 months in 1831 ostensibly to study penal reform. Following his trip, he wrote this book. As I am not a historian, I am not well placed to challenge his experience of 1830s American society, so this will be more about trying to bring out some ideas and themes which could be applied to enliven our increasingly stale democracy, as well as to bring out some interesting nuggets about American history.
A theme which is repeatedly bought up in the book is how America is an exception as a country due to its origins. He uses the history of the nation to explain why the political system in America is very different to those in Europe at the time. This seems like a conservative way of looking at things (change is only gradual so what we see now can be explained by conditions from centirues ago), but as he expands on it, I came to see how powerful it is as an idea to explain their customs, perspectives and institutions.
In short, the communities of America were forged by English settlers who came over to make better lives for themselves and found vast fertile land on which to do so. These were usually educated men and women with Christian backgrounds and a belief in equality. From here, civil participation grew at the grassroots level with the township (approx. 2k-3k people) forming a locus of local politics. This then led to the formation of counties, then states then the Union. By starting as townships without complex power structures, an egalitarian democracy came naturally to the people with checks and balances to ensure that appropriate powers were divided up to the appropriate bodies. Alongside this, with expansive untapped resources out to the West the more industrious and enterprising citizens could expand outwards and grow the size of the Union.
Not just is America fortunate that their society grew from a place of equality among citizens, the geography of the Union meant that there were very few external threats to the country. This contrasts with 1830s Europe in which states required a large, expensive army and a political system more suited to strength than common participation. Tocqueville points out that the nature of the decentralised democracy in America wasn’t available to nations in Europe, who would be quickly snapped up in war by ambitious neighbours.
The shape that the democracy takes in the book is one of the most engaging parts of it. He describes the democratic nature of the township as a political unit where ordinary daily needs are handled and discussed in the spirit of communal improvement. Administration tasks are carried out by selectmen, who are chosen once per year. He describes the liberation provided by democracy in this form as:
Without town institutions a nation can establish a free government but has not the spirit of freedom itself.
By involving the people, there is a more restless politics, where laws change frequently because the citizens are striving to improve the life situation of themselves and their neighbours. This is seen as a good thing, which contrasts with centralised government, which places a barrier between the people and the institutions which govern them to ensure the status quo is maintained.
There are also benefits to the citizens for their political involvement. It benefits their self-esteem and they go about their business with a desire for improvement of the community. We also see improvements in the practical and moral facilities of the citizens as “reason is more use to men than genius,” so that engagement acts as a source of education for them.
Although much of the book is outdated (for example the references to the limitations of power of the President and the neutrality that America maintains in global issues), there are also a few gems of wisdom relevant to the politics of today:
- On decentralisation: “since nothing needs to gather at a common center, there are neither great capital cities, nor inordinate wealth, nor extreme poverty, nor sudden revolutions.” This provides an argument for not just decentralisation of power, but also a wide dispersion of jobs and infrastructure spending across the country.
- When a party gains an ‘irresistable advantage’ of power, “beneath this apparent unanimity deep divisions and real opposition still lie hidden.” We see this today where the hubris of the victors in political argument can often hide the true state of affairs. For example the liberal hegemony that emerged in the late-90s through to the mid-2010s, hid the populist forces which swept Brexit and Trump into power.
- The advantages of a local and pluralist press to form constructive opposition to local issues without being the source of great waves of opinion
- A nice passage (which I quote in my essay on perspective) on how the views of our leaders should reflect those of the people being governed: “No doubt it is important to the welfare of nations that their rulers possess values and talents but what possibly matters even more is that their rulers do not have interests in opposition to the mass of constituents for, in such a case, those virtues could become almost useless and those talents harmful.”
- For anyone that’s watched American sporting events: “there is nothing more irksome than the irritable patriotism that Americans have.”
For all the positivity of the American democracy throughout the book, Tocqueville is constantly on guard against tyranny, casting it as the one thing that should be avoided. My understanding is that the second volume is more negative than the first regarding threats to democracy, but he gives several interesting examples of safeguards as a bulwark against tyranny:
- The presence of power structures away from a central source (e.g. family, townships, local customs, free associations, etc.) meaning we don’t have to fight government as individuals
- No need for a defensive military force
- No great capital to take sovereignty from the township
- Municipal (town/county/state) institutions
- Separation of church and state
- A belief in education for all
Above, I have presented how society in 1830s America could be used to inspire a more active democracy in our times through decentralisation of power and civic engagement. However, there are two colossal injustices of that time in the treatment of non-white people which need to be acknowledged. Although the potential to grow out west was hugely beneficial to the American state, this was at the expense of the Native Indian tribes who previously lived off the land. They were bullied off of their territories, repeatedly lied to by the government of the Union and their numbers dwindled. I don’t have any good answers to how to right these wrongs as the issue is complex and I know very little of it. Regardless, it should not be forgotten that America came to be the prosperous continent-spanning nation it is today in part due to poor treatment of Native Americans.
There is also the issue of slavery. Tocqueville wrote at a time where slavery was still in place in much of the South, having been banned across the North. Even in the North, black people who were free were treated with very little respect. He writes with a note of despair about the situation, without coming down as hard on the slave owners as one would hope. We now know today that the Civil War was fought over the issue in the 1860s, and since the role of slavery is only touched on here I would imagine for a more rounded take on the role of slavery in the growth of America could be found elsewhere. However, there were many slaves, outnumbering the white people in some states, so this wrong should also be remembered as playing a large role in what 1830s America looked like.
Training Thoughts
Been a couple of weeks now but still buzzing off of my ‘how far can I run in an hour’ attempt here. Possibly my best flat effort since the London marathon in 2019. Haven’t quite been smashing the training since (potential dehydration/overtraining run today), hopefully a lighter week next week can get me back on top.
Coding Projects
Nothing to report here, need to get my head in the game for Google CodeJam starting next Saturday!
Top Twitter Follows
There’s a twitter account called Miners Strike which tweets out old news reports and updates as if we were in 1984/85 about one of the episodes which shaped modern British politics. For those involved, there is still an incredible level of raw emotion about what happened, which can be seen in the replies. Very interesting, as it’s not an issue which gets touched on too much but clearly the wounds run deep for those from the communities involved. I’m sure a book would give a more balanced view, but the account manages to bring the history of the Miners Strike to life in a slight different way.
Other Thoughts
One of my pet peeves is articles about about ‘easy ways’ to help fight climate change (or sometimes dieting) which give tiny ‘solutions’ of miniscule benefit which are dwarfed by other, more emitting, actions at the individual level (for example eating meat or transatlantic flying.) This is a classic example. Their 5 ways are:
- Clean using vinegar (as a way to fight climate change I feel marginal would be an overstatement)
- Drink loose leaf tea (incredibly marginal and unnecessary life faff)
- Do less laundry (asking people to handwash clothes feels like a lot of effort for not much gain)
- Eat seasonally. I tried eating seasonally and honestly, it’s really difficult. As it is most people don’t eat fresh I feel this is a losing battle.
- Recycle trainers. Sure, this is easy and people may not know it’s doable. On the other hand very little gain.
The problem I have is that these articles each produce new ‘easy’ ways to ‘fight’ climate change, which shifts responsibility from the state onto the individual, but with no perspective on how much benefit each action does. Many people at or below the poverty line lead stressed lives with low pay, and asking them to do these things feels unfair. Often, there are easier interventions to be made, rather than adding to a long list provided by other such articles. The target audience seems to be the kind of person who assidiously recycles but drive 4x4s and insist on going on 3+ overseas vacations per year. All-in-all, good hate reading but it really shouldn’t be there in the first place in my opinion.