This is Jürgen Habermas's most concrete historical-sociological book and one of the key contributions to political thought in the postwar period. It will be a revelation to those who have known Habermas only through his theoretical writing to find his later interests in problems of legitimation and communication foreshadowed in this lucid study of the origins, nature, and evolution of public opinion in democratic societies.

An account of the emergence and disintegration of.

The authors offer ways to encourage and educate Americans to participate in the public deliberations that make democracy work and lay out the principles of..

L.M. Siedentop's short introduction to Tocqueville's life, work, and contribution to modern political theory demonstrates lucidly both the force and the subtleties of Tocqueville's ideas, and their importance for societies now embracing modern democracy.

The first English translation of the major political works of Benjamin Constant (1767-1830), one of the most important of the French political figures in the aftermath of the revolution of 1789, and a leading member of the liberal opposition to Napoleon and later to the restored Bourbon monarchy. The texts included in this volume are widely regarded as one of the classic formulations of modern liberal doctrine.

This paper investigates the relation between Tocqueville's conceptual framework and the political thought of the French doctrinaires (Guizot, Royer-Collard, Remusat), that has been unduly neglected by political theorists in the English-speaking world. After a brief description of the doctrinaire group, the paper points out similarities and differences between Tocqueville and the doctrinaires with regard to such issues as history, civilization, the French Revolution, the politics of the July Monarchy, centralization and local liberties, and the contrast between aristocratic and democratic societies. (...) The most important section is devoted to democracy as social condition, a theme which appeared in the political writings of the French doctrinaires more than a decade before Tocqueville's Democracy in America. The final section explores the fundamental distinction between social and political order, which looms large in both Guizot's and Royer-Collard's writings and speeches. (shrink)

A survey of democratic institutions and republics reveals the aristocratic origins of democracy.