"Een soort heilige angst": Alexis de Tocqueville en de (Amerikaanse) democratie

Samenvatting

Alexis de Tocqueville and the (American) democracy. This is an article advocating the study of the unabridged version of De la démocratie en Amérique. The book is frequently quoted at random, but Tocqueville's intentions when writing it have been much less frequently analysed. Tocqueville was in pursuit of "une science politique nouvelle à un monde tout nouveau" - the world of democracy. He believed a great deal of material for it could be found in the United States, and after visiting the country he subjected it to methodical and perspicuous study. According to Tocqueville, many of America's customs and norms might well be recommended for Europe, where there was no stopping the rise of the equality ideal. But his enthusiasm did not pertain to everything he saw in America. One can either emphasize the positive or the negative points he summed up about America. One might also wonder whether his preoccupation with reconciling freedom and equality did not keep him from presenting an accurate picture of the country as it had been created by history. One is nonetheless repeatedly struck by his acute perception of the pros and cons of democracy in general and in the United States in particular. The article gives several examples of Americanstyle democracy. The author, however, is of the opinion that Tocqueville's argumentation centres on his conviction that social processes can be guided by making use of human reason and its resistance to fatalism and pessimism, even though he realized that "un cercle fatale" had been drawn around human freedom.