Tocqueville’s Take On Individualism

What if the biggest threat to freedom isn’t a tyrant but our quiet decision to sit out civic life? We dive into Alexis de Tocqueville’s striking idea of “individualism” as a democratic habit of withdrawal—not mere selfishness—and trace how that mindset can hollow out participation, invite overreach, and make liberty feel ornamental instead of lived.

With Dr. Zachary German from the Institute of American Civics, we unpack why Tocqueville saw this tendency as an intellectual mistake and how he hoped to redirect it rather than erase it. The turning point is “self-interest well understood,” a practical ethic that shows why small sacrifices for shared goods serve our long-term interests. From town roads and school boards to committees and neighborhood groups, local politics becomes the classroom of freedom, where cooperation is unavoidable and tradeoffs are clear. We talk through the texture of those habits—listening, organizing, compromising—and why frequency matters more than grand gestures.

We also probe the complicated role of religion and associations in stitching people back into community. Faith communities can steady democratic life by offering purpose and mutual care, even as democratic culture pushes faith toward utility. Then we wrestle with social media: a powerful tool for organizing that can also perfect solitude and curate away our neighbors. The test is simple and demanding—do digital ties become embodied action that improves the places we share?

By the end, we confront Tocqueville’s enduring question: if the old habits have faded, how do we rebuild them now? The answer won’t come from a distant center. It begins close to home, with modest commitments repeated often. If this conversation resonates, follow the show, share it with a friend who cares about civic life, and leave a review with one small action you’ll take this week.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Guest Introduction
• 2:29 Defining Tocqueville’s Individualism
• 6:15 Risks: Withdrawal And Despotism
• 10:37 The Remedy: Self-Interest Well Understood
• 14:06 Why Local Politics Builds Civic Bonds
• 17:06 Can Religion Counter Individualism?
• 19:46 Social Media: Community Or Isolation?
• 23:26 What Do We Do Now?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:48

Welcome back to Civics in the Year. We are doing another episode on Alexis Satokeville. And I have personally found this very interesting because I feel like I've read a lot of things. I've never read Democracy in America, I'm being very honest. And I have learned so much from Dr. Beinberg, Dr. Mahoney, and now I'm stoked to have Dr. Zachary German, who is an assistant professor at the Institute of American Civics at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. I am stoked because Dr. German and I used to work together at the School for Civic and Economic Leadership, Thought and Leadership, Stebbel, it is a very long name. But we got to work on things like our Civic Leadership Institute for high school students. And I do miss working with you, Dr. German, but I know that the University of Tennessee is very lucky to have you. So we're continuing our conversation on Alexis to Tocqueville. And I've learned so much already. Dr. German, Alexis Tocqueville talks about the term individualism. And when I think of individualism, especially in the present, it's it might be very different than what Tocqueville thought. So can we talk about what does Alexis Hutokville mean when he's talking about individualism within his writings on democracy in America?

SPEAKER_01: 2:11

Sure. But first, Liz, let me say thank you for thanks for having me. It's it's wonderful to work with you again, even if it's just for a podcast, but also always wonderful to have the opportunity to talk about Tocqueville any chance you get. So yeah, so this is this is an important question about what Tocqueville means by individualism, because I think it is different from kind of our common notions today. Um, so for one thing, he says as he's writing Democracy in America, he says that it's a new term for a new idea. It's not a universal part of the human experience that has always been around. Um, it's not something that you will find in every type of society. It's not a synonym uh for uh selfishness, it's not a euphemism for selfishness. He says it's something different from that, um, which which he says selfishness is a timeless universal flaw of human nature. And but he says it's not individualism is not a moral character flaw. Rather, it's a sentiment that flows from an intellectual mistake or an error of judgment. Uh, and it may lead to moral vices, it leads to things like selfishness, but it's not the same as being a moral vice or being the vice of selfishness. So, what is it? What is the intellectual mistake? Uh, what is the sentiment that flows from that intellectual mistake? Well, he's he says basically that it seems to be the idea that that we are isolated individuals. We have our families, we have our friends, but beyond our our family members and our particular friends, we don't see ourselves as meaningfully connected to our community beyond that. We don't see ourselves as having bonds with our neighbors and our fellow citizens outside of our family and our friends, and that this leads us to focus on ourselves. It leads us to kind of withdraw from our broader community and to just focus on our own interests, our own lives. So that's what he means by individualism. And he says that it's it is unique to democratic societies because for Tocqueville, uh, the contrast to a democratic society that he uses consistently is an aristocracy, an aristocratic society. And he says that in aristocratic societies, you have all of these social, cultural, familial infrastructures to remind you that you're connected to other human beings. You're connected to other human beings in your society, you're connected to your ancestors, you're connected to your descendants that aren't even born yet. And you have all of these reminders of that in aristocracies that you don't have in democratic life. Um, and so individualism is something that we see specifically in democracies.

SPEAKER_00: 5:15

So he, you know, he's talking about individualism. And I'm glad that you talked about like it's not the necessarily the definition we have today, right? Because when when I first heard that word, I was like, I feel like Americans are very individualistic, like, but this is a very different term. So what was his concern? Because you're talking about, you know, we have these societies and these communities. What was Tocqueville's concern if that structure didn't exist and people just kind of withdrew from life, like community life, if you will?

SPEAKER_01: 5:49

Yeah. So he he had several concerns about what the consequences of this might be. If it's not remedied, if it's not checked, and we we can talk about this later. But he did see in America reasons for hope that this could be addressed effectively in a democratic society. But one of the things he's worried about is that people will withdraw from public life. They'll they will withdraw from engagement in the civic life of their communities because they don't they don't see how their lives are tied up with the interests of their broader community. They don't see how their self-interest is connected to the interest of their community. And so they have better things to do, more important things to do, more pressing things to do in their own lives rather than to get involved in civic life. And so one of the things we're likely to see is less active engagement from citizens in politics and civic life. And also that means more delegation of political decisions and political activities to some centralized governmental entity. Related to that, one of the things that he is concerned about is that this makes a people vulnerable to old-fashioned despotism because he says that despots like people to be isolated and weak, because groups of people that are united, groups of citizens that are united with each other, working together, committed to each other, those people are more difficult to control and subdue than a bunch of isolated individuals. So he thinks that individualism unchecked can lead to vulnerabilities, to kind of old-fashioned despotism, old-fashioned tyranny. But he also is worried that it can lead to something new that we now call people who talk about Tocqueville, call it democratic despotism or soft despotism. But he actually says he doesn't have a name for it because it's such a new phenomenon. And basically, what this phenomenon is, is that because we are relatively weak, isolated individuals, if this develops, then we are more and more likely to turn to the only source of help that we see, which is the government. And so government grows, government becomes more involved in our lives. This this can be to serve our needs, to fulfill what we think a government should provide to us, but it comes with a restriction of liberty, according to Tocqueville, that can eventually result in a new type of despotism where we don't have meaningful freedom. And it can be something that we brought about because we were asking for help. We were asking for the government to intervene.

SPEAKER_00: 8:38

It's so interesting because when I was chatting with Dr. Beinberg, I made the quip of like, did Tocqueville have a crystal ball? Because as you're saying that, I can think of times in history, both American and world history, where I'm like, I have seen this happen. You mentioned checks on individualism. Can you go more into that? Like, what would be a check for this?

SPEAKER_01: 9:01

Yeah, so Tocqueville, Tocqueville tries to be realistic about what can be done. He's willing to make considerable concessions to the fact that like democracies are going to have certain trends, they're going to have certain tendencies, and there only there's only so much we can do to address some of the dangers or negative consequences of democratic society that he's worried about. So he doesn't think that he's going to convince people to just stop being self-interested, to stop focusing primarily on their own lives and to just give up all of their time and resources to like investing in in their community, investing in public life. But he does think that there are ways to remedy individualism from being excessive. And one of the, I guess, a key to what he hopes will happen in a democratic society is that people will see the connection between their self-interest and the interest of their community so that they won't see those as in competition with each other, but they'll see that there is a need to sacrifice some of your, some of your own narrow self-interest, but it serves you as well as everyone else in the long run to do that. Um, so he refers to a concept that he calls self-interest well understood or self-interest rightly understood. We sometimes call it enlightened self-interest. So to understand that sometimes you need to work together with others and make some sacrifices for a greater good, and that's actually good for you individually as well. And he says that this is the most persuasive kind of moral argument that you can make to democratic individuals is to tell them, like, this is really for your good, but you need to make some sacrifices for your community and it will serve you in the long run. Now, okay, now how to convince people of that? One of the key resources for doing that is local political participation. For one thing, local politics, when you're in when you're engaged in local politics, if you're running for election or if you're just trying to get something done on a committee or with a town council, like you realize that you need the help of others, that you're not doing this on your own, that you need to cooperate, collaborate with other people in order to get done what you need to get done. Local politics also, Tocqueville says, shows us clearly in ways that national politics does not always shows us clearly the connection between our interests and the interests or affairs of the community. So an example he gives is like when when it comes to the town needing or wanting to pass a road through your property, a road through your field, like immediately you realize there is this important connection between your private interests and the public interest. And you can see that with local policy matters in a direct way that larger political issues, it's not always easy to see the connection between your own life and how it relates to those political issues. Um and also he also says that local politics, being involved in local politics, just forces you to pay attention to other people's concerns, that it can no longer just be all about your own interests and your own life. You just see the concerns that other people have. And lastly, I think local politics makes it possible to be engaged civically in many, many ways, very frequently. And this seems important to Tocqueville that you need to be reminded of these things in order to combat individualism, you need the constant reminders, the frequent reminders of how your life is tied up with other people's lives and the community. And local politics makes that makes that possible because there are so many ways to be involved as opposed to you know voting in a national election every couple of years.

SPEAKER_00: 13:12

So does Tocqueville think that individualism is a danger to be feared, or more of a human tendency that we can kind of redirect?

SPEAKER_01: 13:25

So I think it is it is a tendency of human beings in democratic societies that needs to be addressed. It's not something this is important about Tocqueville's approach to his concerns about democracies generally. It's not something to be eradicated. And Tocqueville, I think, would be concerned about a pendulum swing too far in the opposite direction as well. So it's not something to be eliminated, it's not something to be replaced with its exact opposite, but it is something that needs to be remedied or that needs to be directed so that it doesn't have these negative consequences. And he also thinks that it's, as he says in his chapter on individualism, he thinks that it is an error in judgment, in the sense that I am in a completely independent individual human being that's not connected to my fellow citizens, that that's an error. He thinks that it's not true. Living in a democratic society makes it easy to believe that it's true and make it makes it almost natural in a sense to believe that it's the truth. But it's still but in a democracy, it's still not true. And so it's something that we need to correct so that we are living more in accordance with the truth of our relationships to our fellow human beings.

SPEAKER_00: 14:55

And can I ask the question too? Because Dr. Mahoney talked about kind of religion as a check. And because, you know, there are the morals and things that go along with it, is religion a check for individualism? And I don't want to phrase this question of like religion is the you know savior and the end all be all, but because that, you know, that community, whatever, you know, religious community you belong to, there are those morals. And, you know, I'm thinking about growing up Catholic, right? Like we have our church and we have morals. And it it required me, you know, as a child and as a teenager to think about the good of my community, whether it was like, you know, my church youth group, the bigger congregation, or just the world at hand. So is is could that be a check for individualism?

SPEAKER_01: 15:49

I think it certainly can be a check or or a remedy for excessive individualism. It's not a focus. Tocqueville covers a lot of ground in democracy in America, and it's not a focus of the way in which he presents the benefits of religion, as far as I can recall. And it's not so he doesn't thematically present religion as one of the remedies to individualism directly. On the other hand, he does talk about associations or civil associations as one of the things that addresses the limits of individualism or the problems of individualism. And among other types of civil associations, religious associations, moral associations that certainly would have a religious component to them are on his mind. So there definitely is a religious dimension there. One thing that came to mind when you brought up uh religion that I think is really fascinating about Tocqueville's analysis is he says that in America, the concept of self-interest well understood or self-interest rightly understood has also influenced the religious beliefs of Americans. And he says that Americans will tell you that the religious activities they engage in, you know, the charity work that they engage in, the ministries that they participate in, they will tell you they're doing that to earn, you know, the goods of the afterlife, that so that they'll be rewarded in in heaven. And at one point he has one of one of his classic Tocquevillian quips where he says that he doesn't really think that's true. He thinks that sometimes American Christians just genuinely sacrifice for the good of others and they're not doing it because they anticipate that they're going to get rewarded in the next life for it. And he says, I respect them too much to believe them when they tell me that they're just they're just making these sacrifices for others in order to stack up rewards in in the afterlife. So it's interesting that, and I'm not sure if you've had the chance to discuss this with others, but religion's place in a democratic society is really interesting for Tocqueville because on the one hand, it is a benefit to democracy, but on the other hand, he sees democracy as shaping religion in the long run. And so it's not clear where that's going to head ultimately, whether religion is going to win out in making democracy better, or whether democracy is going to remake religion in its image. But certainly I think there's a role for religion in addressing individualism. It's a source of community, it's it is another reminder that you are not just an atomistic individual, but that you're part of broader communities.

SPEAKER_00: 18:50

One more question. And because I have my teacher hat on, because if I am talking about this in a classroom, when we talk about like civic communities, I think for you know, generations that are in school right now, their civic community is social media. What do you think is if Tocqueville is observing this? How do you feel he would, you know, think about this? Like, does this intensify individualism, or is this again just another way to come into a civic community? And I know, I know that's a really big question, but as I'm talking about this in class, I know that there's going to be students that are like, well, what about social media? Because for them, that is their civic community.

SPEAKER_01: 19:41

Yes, uh I think this is a really tricky question. On the one hand, I'm tempted to say that social media, or more generally, the extent to which our lives are mediated by screens every day is an intensification of individualism, that we have these little machines in our hand that are like the ultimate machines of individualistic entertainment, that they are run on exceedingly sophisticated algorithms to feed us particularly what we want to see. And we we had the opportunity to, you know, to select for ourselves exactly what we want to experience. And it also seems like these screens serve as a barrier to experiencing the world around us and to interacting with the people around us, so much so that you don't even have to stomach like and and Elevator ride with a stranger without looking at your phone to avoid the awkwardness of being next to someone that that you don't know. So my concern would be that these are not really meaningful sources of community, and that if anything, they are symptom of kind of our individualistic tendencies and technology, technology feeding into that or capitalizing on that. I do see the counter-argument that they can be sources of community, that they can facilitate community. And I guess one Tocquevillian point that you can make related to that is that for Tocqueville, newspapers are incredibly important in what he's observing because he says that newspapers are a way that people communicate with each other. They reveal the common interests that people share, and they're what they're they are the ways in which members of an association are able to organize and coordinate across distance. And so you could say that social media is a really fast, really efficient way of doing that today. And we do see that in many cases, that people communicate and organize and coordinate their actions through technology. So I think there's potential there, but I think my worry would be that it pushes more towards what Tocqueville considers the problems of excessive individualism more than it addresses them.

unknown: 22:18

Dr.

SPEAKER_00: 22:19

German, thank you. And I know that that was kind of just a really big question, but I appreciate you taking us through your thought process because one of the things with these primary sources and with these older documents is having that thought process, right? And having your opinion, but also stating that counter-argument and how you can definitely see the other side. So I'm like, your answer there. I'm like, that would be something I would use in class because you essentially just created an argument acknowledging the other side, but also acknowledging, like, we don't actually know what Alexis Satoville would think because he probably didn't think about social media and things like that. So, Dr. Herman, to say that I miss working with you would be just the understatement of my week, but I so appreciate you coming on and having these thoughtful conversations about individualism. Again, I have learned so much through these podcasts. And now I know so much more about Alexis to Tocqueville. Is there anything else you want to make sure our listeners know or any questions that you want to leave them with?

SPEAKER_01: 23:31

Well, I think the question that Tocqueville leaves us with, if we take seriously his concerns about democratic society. And one of the things that I love about Tocqueville and love about teaching Tocqueville is that he's observing America in the 1830s. He's writing about America in the 1830s, and yet somehow he seems to be speaking to concerns that we still have today. But he leaves us with the question of so what do we do now? One of the he does not give us a clear answer. He speaks of these remedies, but it's not clear what we do if the habits of those remedies have faded with time. So he sees a really robust tradition practice of local political life in America that maybe is not so robust now. It's maybe not so in deeply embedded in our habits and norms. The same goes for associational life that he says Americans basically can't think of doing anything without starting an association. Like the smallest thing they want to accomplish, they start a committee or they start an organization to do it. Maybe that's not so strong of a habit or a norm now. And in my reading of Tocqueville, it's not entirely clear how you get that back or how you restore it once it's gone. If the tendencies, if the natural tendencies of a democratic society take us away from those practices, those habits. But fortunately there were reasons that America had them. But if we've lost them or at least lost them to some degree, then what do we do now? I'm not exactly sure what Tocqueville's answer would be. I'm not exactly sure what a satisfying and real both realistic and satisfying answer would be. But I think maybe this is a bit paradoxical because I'm going to say it's something that we should do as individuals, but we have to figure out what we can do. Like start, start doing the things that that if more people engaged in them together, it would lead to a healthier and more constructive civic life for us today. And in your own way, that may be very small and thus it may seem inconsequential when we're when we are constantly focused on large national challenges and problems and worries. But that's but it's really all we can do, and I think it's worth doing. And one thing that is consistent about Tocqueville is that even as he has these deep, intense worries about things, he seasons that with hope and with a determination of like, we don't have to give up, we don't have to be fatalistic about this. There are things to be done. And so I think that I think that's what I would conclude with is think about the way in which you could restore commitment to to being part of your community and being involved in your community.

SPEAKER_00: 26:34

Dr. German, you rock. Thank you so much for being on our podcast.

SPEAKER_01: 26:38

Thanks, Liz. Appreciate it.