What argument did Alexis de Tocqueville make in The Old Regime and the Revolution?

In The Old Regime and the Revolution (1856), Alexis de Tocqueville argued that the French Revolution did not represent a complete break from the past, but rather a continuation of long-standing political trends.1

His central thesis emphasized the durability of two specific elements in French history: administrative centralization and class hostility. Tocqueville contended that the post-revolutionary society remained as prepared to accept despotism as the society of the old regime had been, suggesting that France was less a democratic society of the future and more a prisoner of its own historical patterns.1

While his analysis of French political tendencies was pessimistic, the work also served to reaffirm the libertarian example of the Anglo-American world. Ultimately, Tocqueville sought to demonstrate that the political behaviors and attitudes that characterized the old regime persisted well into the revolutionary and post-revolutionary eras.1