Tocqueville and the Frontiers of Democracy

Description

Author: Ewa Atanassow
Format: Paperback, 152mm x 227mm, 510g, 388 pages
Published: Cambridge University Press, United Kingdom, 2013

Alexis de Tocqueville is widely cited as an authority on civil society, religion and American political culture, yet his thoughts on democratization outside the West and the challenges of a globalizing age are less known and often misunderstood. This collection of essays by a distinguished group of international scholars explores Tocqueville’s vision of democracy in Asia and the Middle East; the relationship between globalization and democracy; colonialism, Islam and Hinduism; and the ethics of international relations. Rather than simply documenting Tocqueville’s own thoughts, the volume applies the Frenchman’s insights to enduring dilemmas of democratization and cross-cultural exchanges in the twenty-first century. This is one of the few books to shift the focus of Tocqueville studies away from America and Western Europe, expanding the frontiers of democracy and highlighting the international dimensions of Tocqueville’s political thought.

Ewa Atanassow is Assistant Professor at ECLA of Bard, a liberal arts university in Berlin. Her research focuses on democracy and nationhood, and on the intersection of ethics, psychology and politics in the liberal tradition of political thought. Richard Boyd is Associate Professor of Government at Georgetown University, where he teaches courses on liberalism, international ethics, and the history of political philosophy. He is the author of Uncivil Society: The Perils of Pluralism and the Making of Modern Liberalism (2004).