Alexis de Tocqueville - the tyranny of the majority

[MichaelYMiles]

Classical liberalism is not the same as libertarianism- classical liberalism is more concerned with negative freedom and a freedom from governments than neo-liberalism!!

[KrugmanTheKing]

@MichaelYMiles

"I have shown how democracy favors the growth of manufactures and increases without limit the numbers of the manufacturing classes; we shall now see by what side-road manufacturers may possibly, in their turn, bring men back to aristocracy."

"He every day becomes more adroit and less industrious; so that it may be said of him that in proportion as the workman improves, the man is degraded."

Let's just pursue for the sake of our education.

[KrugmanTheKing]

@MichaelYMiles

"When a workman has spent a considerable portion of his existence in this manner, his thoughts are forever set upon the object of his daily toil; his body has contracted certain fixed habits, which it can never shake off; in a word, he no longer belongs to himself, but to the calling that he has chosen."

"[...] [A]t the very time at which the science of manufactures lowers the class of workmen, it raises the class of masters."

[KrugmanTheKing]

@MichaelYMiles

"The master and the workman have then here no similarity, and their differences increase every day. They are connected only like the two rings at the extremities of a long chain. Each of them fills the station which is made for him, and which he does not leave; the one is continually, closely, and necessarily dependent upon the other and seems as much born to obey as that other is to command. What is this but aristocracy?"

[KrugmanTheKing]

@MichaelYMiles

I don't know how you call that, but that's from a prominent advocate of freedom and is also a classical liberal. The person who wrote this is Tocqueville and you do not have to work hard to find these lines: they're all in the same page!

And I do not know what you think of these lines, but they presented a concern much akin to that found in Marx... that wage labor is slavery, that it's not to choose between justice and freedom, but to either have them both or loose them both.

[KrugmanTheKing]

@MichaelYMiles

I got better:

"Nevertheless, the friends of democracy should keep their eyes anxiously fixed in this direction; for if ever a permanent inequality of conditions and aristocracy again penetrates into the world, it may be predicted that this is the gate by which they will enter."

That's published in 1838 by a liberal thinker.

[robertquentincobb]

Great discussion.. Our Senate, along with adopting to pledge and read the constitution weekly or monthly, should read the principles of Alexis de Tocqueville on the Senate floor as well. I think it would be a great start for America to get back on track.

[TheCIAsucks]

Proporational representation and election reform are necessary to free us from the tyranny of the corporate and banker elites who are a minority and who control the majority of wealth and political power in this nation. We need equal political power and more demcracy, even direct democracy on a vaste number of issues. One person, one vote. Both parties are turning this nation into a police state.

[LeglessPabloSmithe]

These are not liberal ideas, they are conservative-- true conservatism, referred to as today as libertarianism. Conservatives usually call for more decentralized and limited government, which Tocqueville wrote about and what Prof. Cook is speaking on. The liberals are the ones who want more centralized government, along with neoconservatives (fake conservatives) who are now the majority in the Republican Party.

[jakster2]

@LeglessPabloSmithe Just because he is teaching it doesn't necessarily mean he subscribes to it. I had Dr. Cook as an instructor back in the late 90's and if memory serves me correctly, he is a member of the democratic party.

[JeresyMike18]

@jakster2 I (old screen name LeglessPabloSmithe) never said Dr. Cook subscribes to it. I said what he was speaking about. On a side note, that is pretty awesome you had Cook as an instructor. From watching these videos he is a great teacher.

[RKAddict101]

@LeglessPabloSmithe Classic liberalism is also the same thing as libertarianism.

[TeaPartyPooper]

it would be so much better if Pat Robertson ruled this country, and used Leviticus Case Law to rule over us

[IronMongol]

The far right preaches this but acts with hypocricy when it comes to race

[lashkaretoiba]

You're a lying mother fucker.

[johncrwarner]

I think you mean that the more libertarian right preach this but are hypocritical about a lot of social issues.

[biantai888]

These are extremely liberal ideas. Why is it in a playlist titled "Conservatism & Conservative Figures"?

[Eternaldream00]

Because this is what the ACTUAL conservative approach in political philosophy teaches. what they call conservatism in the U.S. nowadays is bullcrap that stole the name. Fox news aren't conservative they r just nazis. dont get mislead ^^

[Rorschach65]

Ridetonowhere: "On LIberty" is one of my favorite political tracts ever. I would put it up there with "Democracy in America" by de Tocqueville.

[Ridetonowhere]

Stuart Mill`s "On Liberty" follows this problem too. But this is a masterpiece.