Tocqueville on Bonapartism as a factor of transformations in the French revolutionary process of the late XVIII - mid XIX centuries

The purpose of the study is to analy/e the content of the concept of Bonapartism, which was formed in the work of the famous French historian of the first half of the XIX century, Alexis Tocqueville, the place of this concept in his study of the French revolutionary process of the late XVIII - mid XIX centuries. The importance to study this aspect of Tocqueville's works was noted by such famous researchers of his scientific work as V.M. Dalin, A.M. Salmin, C. Lefort, J. Lefebvre, P. Moreau. At the same time, this side of the scientist's historical ideas is still poorly researched. The sources for analy/ing the content of the concept of Bonapartism developed by Tocqueville were the texts of his works Democracy in America, Memoirs, Old Order and Revolution, draft materials for writing a continuation of the book Old Order and Revolution, speeches, and personal correspondence. The article describes the tendency of the development of bourgeois societies of the New Age epoch towards authoritarian rule, which he called “democratic despotism”, and reveals the prerequisites for its formation, studied by Tocqueville. It is shown that in the history of his own country, this form of rule gained flesh and blood in Bonapartism, which was most vividly embodied in the political system and political practice of the First Empire, generated by the dynamics of the Great French Revolution, and the Second Empire, which broke off the sharp confrontations of the February Revolution. Based on this historical experience of France, Tocqueville formed the basic characteristics of nature, the social basis and essence of Bonapartism, the fundamental knowledge of its nature, forms and methods. As a result of the study, the author of the article came to the following conclusions and generalizations. The concept of Bonapartism, developed by Alexis Tocqueville, contains a number of unconditional scientific merits, consisting in the fact that it reveals the nature of Bonapartism, reveals the causes and prerequisites for its formation - historical, political, social, psychological; the role of this form of rule in the development of the French revolutionary process of the late XVIII - mid XIX centuries.

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