Editing Alexis de Tocqueville (section)

=== On democracy and new forms of tyranny ===
{{Conservatism in France|Intellectuals}}
Tocqueville warned that modern democracy may be adept at inventing new forms of tyranny because radical equality could lead to the materialism of an expanding bourgeoisie and to the selfishness of individualism. "In such conditions, we might become so enamored with 'a relaxed love of present enjoyments' that we lose interest in the future of our descendants...and meekly allow ourselves to be led in ignorance by a despotic force all the more powerful because it does not resemble one", wrote ''The New Yorker''{{'}}s James Wood.<ref>James Wood. [http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2010/05/17/tocqueville-in-america "Tocqueville In America"]. ''The New Yorker''. 17 May 2010.</ref> Tocqueville worried that if [[despotism]] were to take root in a modern democracy, it would be a much more dangerous version than the oppression under the Roman emperors or tyrants of the past who could only exert a pernicious influence on a small group of people at a time.<ref name=twsC11r44/>

In contrast, a despotism under a democracy could see "a multitude of men", uniformly alike, equal, "constantly circling for petty pleasures", unaware of fellow citizens and subject to the will of a powerful state which exerted an "immense protective power".<ref name=twsC11r44/> Tocqueville compared a potentially despotic democratic government to a protective parent who wants to keep its citizens (children) as "perpetual children" and which does not break men's wills but rather guides it and presides over people in the same way as a shepherd looking after a "flock of timid animals".<ref name=twsC11r44/>