Chasing the Red, White and Blue

A journey in Alexis de Tocqueville's footsteps through contemporary America. At a time of national and global crisis, Cohen's fresh observations on the nature of the American spirit, the American Dream, and of democracy itself are particularly relevant.

---

In 1931, a 26 year old Frenchman named Alexis de Tocqueville made a journey to America to see what his own country and all of Europe might have, in his own words, "to fear or hope from its progress". The result of his visit was the classic text, Democracy in America. His distillation of America's national character is widely regarded, even today, as perhaps the most insightful ever written. But is it? Award-winning British journalist, David Cohen, asked himself that very question. To answer it, he set off across America following Tocqueville's footsteps. The result is Chasing the Red, White and Blue: A Journey in Tocqueville's Footsteps through Contemporary America. During his stay in the U.S., Tocqueville travelled the length and breadth of the country, talking to everyone, from ordinary folk to the cream of New York society, and from prison inmates to President Andrew. At the end of the 20th century, David Cohen made that same journey, with one new destination - the frontier of Silicon Valley in California. Chasing the Red, White and Blue is his account: a funny, powerful, troubling and thought-provoking enquiry into the lives of Americans today.
Having talked to people across the full range of society Cohen finds equality elusive and the poor increasingly adrift from American society. At the same time, he finds hope alive in the most poignant of places.