ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at two influential political science thinkers, Tocqueville and Mill, and to investigate the implications of their thinking for developmental psychology, particularly developmental child psychology. Instead, it describes Alexis de Tocqueville's Democracy in America, the first volume of which was published in 1834, and the second in 1840; and John Stuart Mill's essay On Liberty, published in 1859, the year of Tocqueville's death. The chapter also talks about developmental psychology. A third and last implication from Tocqueville's study, after individualism and the various group effects, concerns the influence of structural factors on liberty. Many of the topics noted have been researched by others; the chapter's intention has been to look at Tocqueville with an open mind and to try to sketch some of the implications for developmental psychology with no regard for the present state of research evidence.
