主题：【原创】谁家子弟谁家院 -- 万里风中虎

Firstly he stresses the point, that even though the French tried to change close to everything with the Revolution, they fell back on patterns that were observable before it, because they could not help but use them as a template. Especially, they wanted to abolish the old system, but yet ended up, as it was the case before, with a strong state, because, paradoxically: it was the only thing that could be envisioned to destruct the old system and yet maintain order. Thus, much of the old system had to be kept, to use it to bring about its destruction. This, in Tocqueville's view is the reason why even though the French tried to change everything, much stayed as it was before.

A second point that Tocqueville repeatedly stresses is that if people don’t want freedom for its own sake but for some other goal, i.e. to further their material interest, then it is unlikely that freedom will not turn into a despotic form of rule, where everyone may be free to further their material interest, but has no political freedom. He thus argues that if material, self-interested behaviour is the offspring for action, people may vote for a government that gives them economic stability, even if the price to pay for this is political freedom.

Thirdly, seeing Tocqueville's work in context to Democracy in America, it can be argued that he saw France as being the opposite of the US. Whereas in France before (and after) the revolution, people relied on the central power instead of becoming economically or politically active themselves, in the US political action took place on a “grassroots” level. There private individuals formed the basis of economic and political life; whereas in France this center of gravity was taken up by the bureaucratic machine