Alexis de Tocquevillle and Bloomington

Scholars from North America, Europe and Asia were at Indiana University Bloomington last week for a conference that examined the work of 19th century French political thinker and author Alexis de Tocqueville in light of recent scholarly publications.

"Alexis de Tocquevillle: New Perspectives on His Works" took place last Friday (5 March). It was organized by the Tocqueville Program at IU Bloomington in collaboration with the Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, the Department of Political Science and Liberty Fund Inc.

On 23 April, the Tocqueville Program will co-sponsor a lecture on the IU Bloomington campus by Jonathan Israel of the School of Historical Studies, Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton, on "Creating Revolutionary Awareness: 'Philosophy' as a main cause of the French Revolution (1770-90)."

Jonathan Israel’s work is concerned with European and European colonial history from the Renaissance to the eighteenth century, with particular emphasis on the history of ideas, the Dutch Golden Age (1590–1713), including the Dutch global trade system, seventeenth-century Dutch Jewry and Spinoza, the "Glorious Revolution" of 1688–91 in Britain, and Spanish imperial strategy especially in Mexico, the Caribbean and the Low Countries.

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