Tocqueville also wrote extensively on what he saw as America’s vulnerabilities. Although people then and now tend to consider the essential tenet of democracy to be the political empowerment of the people, this alone does not produce a successful democracy—the people can be effectively empowered only if they have enough context to make good decisions. Tocqueville emphasized this point, noting that “in the United States the instruction of the people powerfully contributes to the support of the democratic republic.”
