This review is valuable for a perspective on Tocqueville almost 180 degrees opposite my own—I take him to be a deep critic of equality for whom a libertarianism of spirit is a last redoubt of human excellence and individuality. He’s almost Nietzsche, but socially minded and sane.https://twitter.com/samuelmoyn/status/1069943173827452928 …
-
-
Replying to @ToryAnarchist
He is proto-Nietzschean, and equality is not his primary value -- creative freedom is, as I spell out. But unlike Nietzsche, who has given up hope, Tocqueville believed there was still a chance to reconcile that primary value with the equality that was also part of God's design.
2 replies 1 retweet 4 likes -
Replying to @samuelmoyn
That creative freedom is hard to square with equality/democracy, but you and I might agree that Tocqueville is compelling in part because he grapples with that. I found
@PatrickDeneen’s Tocqueville too sunny, but yours challenges me even more—which is all to the good.1 reply 0 retweets 1 like -
But an important problem—if all are capable of creative freedom, then democratic liberalism stands, tho it might look like
@PatrickDeneen’s cultural nightmare. But if not everyone is capable of self-creativity, then liberalism masks an illiberal reality—as Deneen & T’ville fear.1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
Spoiler alert: all are capable of creative freedom.
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.