Tinct · Library · Democracy in America · Chapter guide

Democracy in America — chapter by chapter

All 96 chapters across two volumes — from the equality of conditions to the new despotism.

The book divides into two volumes written five years apart. Volume I (1835) is political and reportorial: the institutions, the township, the constitution, the tyranny of the majority, and the long final chapter on the three races of America. Volume II (1840) is sociological and prophetic: four parts covering the influence of equality on intellect, on sentiment, on manners, and on political society. The later volume is darker. Read Volume I for the diagnosis; read Volume II — especially Part 4 — for the prognosis.

Vol I · Part 1

The physical stage and the foundational institutions: geography, origins, social conditions, sovereignty, townships, and courts.

Vol I · Part 2

How democracy governs: the federal constitution, parties, the press, associations, the majority, slavery, and the three races.

Vol II · Part 1

The influence of democracy on intellectual life: method, belief, general ideas, science, art, literature, and language.

Vol II · Part 2

The influence of equality on sentiments: individualism, associations, self-interest, religion, restlessness, and manufacturing.

Vol II · Part 3

Equality and manners: social intercourse, masters and servants, wages, family, women, honour, ambition, and war.

Vol II · Part 4

The political consequences of equality: centralisation, soft despotism, and the general survey of the subject.

The book itself
Summary & story
What Democracy in America is, the story without spoilers, the themes.
Analysis
Themes
Equality, liberty, and what democracy does to the human soul.
Who's who
The observers and the observed
Tocqueville, his informants, and the American people he found so illuminating.

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