SOC101Y1 Chapter : Tocqueville- Reading notes
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What sort of despotism democratic nations have to fear. * in past ages there had never been a sovereign so absolute and so powerful that he could by himself alone, without the aid of secondary powers, undertake to administer every part of a great empire. * no on had ever tried to subject all his people indiscriminately to the details of a uniform code, nor personally to prompt and lead every single one of his subjects. Time of the roman emperor: different peoples of the empire still preserved various customs and mores. Although they obeyed the same monarch, most provinces had a separate administration. -> the details of social life and personal everyday existence normally escaped his control. The burden of their tyranny fell most heavily on some, but it never spread over a great number. It had a few main targets and left the rest alone. It was violent, but its extent was limited.
