History
W 4384
Undergraduate
Seminar
Tuesday,
2:10-4:00 p.m.
522B
Kent Hall
Samuel
Moyn, Assistant Professor
Department
of History, Columbia University
Fayerweather
616
(212)
854-300
AOL IM:
samuelmoyn
This
seminar provides an overview of the political and social theory of the French
liberal thinker Alexis de Tocqueville, in the context of nineteenth-century
French liberalism, and then turns to his revival in French social thought in
the present day.
The
study of his writings seeks to place him in the nineteenth century and examine
how he understood the promise and problems of democracy on the brink of its
emergence; the study of his self-appointed heirs asks what is worth following
and what is worth rejecting in his image of modernity and in the way he posed
and solved the problems of social disintegration and tyrannical dominance in an
age of individualism.
This is
a reading rather than a research seminar. Though of course you will have a
final paper (on which see below), the critical requirement is that you attend
class throughout the semester having read and engaged carefully with the
assignments. Do not sign up for this course if you do not think you can meet
this baseline requirement, or if the nature of your obligations this semester
is too onerous for you to be able to meet it throughout (including those
weeks when you have deadlines for other classes).
Each
student must report on one extra source during the course of the semester
(possibilities for such reports are listed week-by-week below), post a message
to the web discussion page once a week (details to be discussed in class), and
write a 15-20 pp. final paper on a topic agreed upon with the instructor. This
paper is intended to be a commentary rather than a research paper. You are not
required to (though of course you may) read additional sources; the emphasis in
thinking about and writing the paper should be conceptual, showing the
depth of your engagement with Tocqueville, his followers, and/or one of the
moral or sociological problems they address.
Hannah
Arendt, On Revolution (Penguin, 014018421X)
Benjamin
Constant, Political Writings (Cambridge, 0521316324)
Marcel
Gauchet, The Disenchantment of the World (Princeton, 0691029377)
Pierre Manent, Tocqueville and the Nature of Democracy (Rowman and
Littlefield, 0847681165)
Alexis
de Tocqueville, The Old Regime and the French Revolution (Anchor, ISBN# 0385092601)
—,
Democracy in America (Harper Perennial Classics, 0060956666)
—,
Writings on Empire and Slavery (Johns Hopkins, 0801877563)
I have also placed on reserve and ordered the following optional
texts for you:
André
Jardin, Tocqueville: A Biography (Johns Hopkins, 0801860679)
George W. Pierson, Tocqueville in America (Johns Hopkins,
0801855063)
(* = to
be placed on reserve as a photocopy in Fayerweather reading room.)
Reading: The
Old Regime and the French Revolution
Report: André
Jardin, Tocqueville: A Biography
R.R.
Palmer, The Two Tocquevilles, Father and Son
Reading: Benjamin
Constant, Political Writings, selections
*Stephen
Holmes, “Constant and Tocqueville: An Unexplored Relationship”
Report: Stephen
Holmes, Benjamin Constant and the Making of Modern Liberalism
Reading: *François
Guizot, The History of Civilization in Europe, Editor’s Intro. and
Lecture 1
*Aurelian
Craiutu, “Tocqueville and the Political Thought of the French
Doctrinaires”
Report: Aurelian
Craiutu, “The ‘Strange’ Liberalism of the French
Doctrinaires”
Larry
Siedentop, “Two Liberal Traditions”
Reading: Democracy
in America,
Volume 1
*J.S. Mill, review of volume
Report: George
Pierson, Tocqueville [and Beaumont] in America
T. and Gustave de Beaumont, On
the Penitentiary System in the United States
T., Journey to America
Beaumont, Marie, or Slavery in
the United States
Seymour Drescher, Tocqueville
and Beaumont on Social Reform
Reading: Democracy
in America,
Volume 2
*J.S. Mill, review of volume
*Seymour Drescher,
“Tocqueville’s Two Démocraties”
Report: Jean-Claude
Lamberti, Tocqueville and the Two “Democracies”
James
T. Schleifer, The Making of Tocqueville’s “Democracy in
America”
Reading: *Tocqueville,
“A Fortnight in the Desert”
—, Writings on Empire
and Slavery
Report: T.,
The “European Revolution” and Correspondence with Gobineau
Mary
Lawlor, Alexis de Tocqueville in the Chamber of Deputies
Harry
Liebersohn, Aristocratic Encounters
Uday Singh Mehta, Liberalism
and Empire
Reading: Tocqueville,
Recollections [this
book is apparently out of print; so you will have to read the reserve copy or
order it used]
Report: Edward
Gargan, Alexis de Tocqueville: The Critical Years, 1848-1851
Richard Herr, Tocqueville and
the Old Regime
Election
Day (Nov. 4): No
Class
Reading: *Marcel
Gauchet, “Tocqueville”
—, The Disenchantment of
the World
Report: Louis
Dumont, Homo Hierarchicus
—,
Essays on Individualism
Reading: *François
Furet, Interpreting the French Revolution, 132-64
Hannah
Arendt, On Revolution
Report: Françoise Mélonio, Tocqueville
in France
Patrice
Higonnet, Goodness beyond Virtue
Isser
Woloch, The New Regime
Reading: Pierre
Manent, Tocqueville and the Nature of Democracy
Report: Joshua
Mitchell, The Fragility of Freedom
Sheldon Wolin, Tocqueville
between Two Worlds
Reading: *Claude
Lefort, Democracy and Political Theory, chaps. 9-10
*Mark Warren, Democracy and
Association,
selections
Report: Robert Bellah et al., Habits
of the Heart
Jean L. Cohen and Andrew Arato, Civil
Society and Political Theory
Robert Putnam, Bowling Alone
Pierre Rosanvallon, The New
Social Question
(for use
in thinking about final paper topics on matters not covered on the syllabus)
Roger
Boesche, The Strange Liberalism of Alexis de Tocqueville
Alan S.
Kahan, Aristocratic Liberalism
Jack
Lively, The Social and Political Thought of Alexis de Tocqueville
Larry
Siedentop, Tocqueville
Cheryl
B. Welch, Tocqueville