Alexis de Tocqueville Statesmanship Award: Background

Established in 1987, the Alexis de Tocqueville Institution Statesmanship Award recognizes outstanding original contributions to democracy around the world.

In making the award, the institution places special emphasis on statesmanship that goes beyond formal government-to-government negotiations or actions of policy makers alone - including economic statecraft (such as 1987 winner William Clayton and 1994’s Wayne Angell); timely recognition of threats and opportunities (Bill Bradley in 1991, Richard Holbrooke in 1996); private or public sector entrepreneurship (Michael Joyce, 1998) ; and popular action or public diplomacy (1989’s award to the Tiananmen Square martyrs, or Jack Kemp’s leadership on inner-city issues in 1990).

1996 statesman Richard Holbrooke (left) discusses democracy in the Balkans with award presenter George Soros.

Its emphasis on these distinctive modes and manners of statesmanship places AdTI in keeping with its namesake, Alexis de Tocqueville. In one of Tocqueville’s first official messages as foreign minister of France, he mildly reprimanded an official in the country’s British Embassy for only reporting on the activities and opinions of a few government elites. When Tocqueville had asked for the trend of thinking in British society, he emphasized, he included newspaper editorials, and rank-and-file British voters and workers.

Likewise, Tocqueville understood that in a democracy, economic, public opinion, and other forms of leadership are as important as (and conceptually may be prior to) government negotiations as such. (See, e.g., Souveniers, Haverill Press edition, London, 1948, pages 300-318.)

"The nature of this award," Representative Christopher Cox, a intelligent critic of U.S. policy towards China, commented in 1999, "makes it especially moving. Here I have a congratulatory telegram from Lech Walesa, whom I consider one of the great leaders of the 20th Century. And I'm looking at the remarks Ronald Reagan made on behalf of Jack Kemp. I'm not sure I belong in their company, but I'm honored."

Presentation of the award takes place at a private, off-the-record ceremony of friends, colleagues, and other officials, often by a guest co-host. The private setting and substantive focus of the discussion is widely regarded as unusual, perhaps unuque, by participants. "Tocqueville events are serious in the best sense of the word -- serious people, serious dialogue, and naturally, serious fun," as Senator Bill Bradley put it at a 1991 monetary policy summit on the 20th anniversary of the Smithsonian accords.

Present at the creation. Gordon Macklin, later a Tocqueville statesman, appears before at a computer terminal that formed part of the original Nasdaq stock exchange on February 8, 1971. By the year 2000, the capitalization value of the Nasdaq had eclipsed the national debt.

Previous presenters or co-presenters have included Lawrence Eagleburger, Arthur Levitt, Dean Acheson Jr., Edmund Muskie, Larry Lindsay, William P. Stewart, Eugene Ravizza, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Donald Payne, Frank Carlucci, Milton Friedman, Howard Cosell, Alveda King, Robert Bartley, Warren Christopher, Bruce Thompson, Harry Wu, John Whitehead, and Ronald Reagan.