Did Tocqueville foresee the evacuation of the political sphere and the disenchantment of McWorld? If it is true, as Bellah asserts, that people are now concentrating on writing their own private narratives, "escaping from imposed systems, the yoke of habit, family maxims, class prejudices, and to a certain extent national prejudices as well"  (all of which, with the possible exception of family maxims, are part of the public and political narrative), and if it is true that at the same time they find this new preoccupation with personal success (with Gray and Barber) increasingly disenchanting, seeking consolation in parochial identities again - then Tocqueville, the master of old, would sadly smile if he were alive. Democracy, preoccupied with equality, has destroyed all distinctions, he would first say , and has produced men who are now "narrowly shut up in himself"  - withdrawn into their very private and individualistic "pursuit of that complete felicity which always escapes him" (and is thus "futile" ). "The taste for physical pleasures must be regarded as the first cause of this secret restlessness betrayed by the actions of the Americans" (and all democrats), Tocqueville would lecture, and add that these people live in "a social state in which neither law nor custom holds anyone in place", because the liberal democratic narrative establishes an order where change is possible, possibly even desired by the disconnected, competitive, individualistic , market like conditions of a liberal democracy. That political narrative of equality in the democracy has had a spill-over effect on private narratives, doing away with old orders there also, as evidenced in Rorty and Gauthier. "But do not underestimate the worth of these local, moral or religious orders," Tocqueville would then say, addressing people’s flight into parochial identities, "for people are in need of them." Barber would nod, and Tocqueville would continue: "Let me tell you about the aristocratic residues which are vital to a democracy - because they are the residence of a particularity rightly understood, as opposed to the loneliness of individualism."
How can Tocqueville's particular insight into the idea of aristocratic institutions as necessary for democracy, and his insight into the special importance of the religious narrative, teach us the appreciation of particular identities, and prevent liberalism from making ignorant claims about them?
    Well, what are aristocratic institutions? Aristocratic institutions for Tocqueville are those which give the individual a home "beyond and above man's lot" , a feeling of belonging to a superior group, a stability outside the vast democratic entity with its "continual jostling of men against each other, which disturbs and distracts the mind without stimulating or elevating it."  They provide, in a sense, the consciousness of particularity rightly understood - not as individualism -, a particularity opposed to the unmediated experience of oneself as one insignificant and weak individual among many others in the democratic mass of people. Individuals with the aristocratic consciousness of being set apart - of even being a stranger the way Tocqueville was a stranger in America - provide them with greatness, as opposed to the democratic weakness:

"In aristocracies, men often have something of greatness and strength which is all their own. When they find themselves at variance with most of their fellows, they retreat into themselves and there find support and consolation. But in democracies it is not like that (...) The more alike men are, the weaker each feels in the face of all. Finding nothing that raises him above their level and distinguished him, he loses self-confidence when he comes into collision with them."

How religion, "the most precious heritage from aristocratic times"  provides individuals with a distinct sense of identity, Tocqueville makes clear where he says:

Every religion also imposes on each man some obligation toward mankind...  Belief in an immaterial and immortal principle, for a time united to matter, is so indispensable to man's greatness... they will have a natural regard and secret admiration for the immaterial part of man, even thought they sometimes refuse to submit to its sway. That is enough to give a somewhat elevated tone to their ideas and tastes and makes them turn, without selfishness and as if of their own accord, to pure feelings and majestic thoughts.

Religion is not the only aristocratic residue. It can also be found in the family, in the legal profession, and in wealth and property:

On the family: "When the American returns from the turmoil of politics to the bosom of the family, he immediately finds a perfect picture of order and peace. There all his pleasures are simple and natural and his joys innocent and quiet, and as the regularity of life brings him happiness, he easily forms the habit of regulating his opinions as well as his tastes. Whereas the European tries to escape his sorrows at home by troubling society, the American derives from his home that love of order which he carries over into affairs of state. "
On property: "Hence family feeling finds a sort of physical expression in the land. The family represents the land, and the land the family, perpetuating its name, origin, glory, power, and virtue. It is an imperishable witness to the past and a precious earnest of the future. "
On wealth: "When the prestige attached to what is old has vanished, men are no longer distinguished, or hardly distinguished, by birth, standing, or profession; there is hardly anything left but money which makes very clear distinctions between men or can raise some of them above the common level. "
On the legal profession: "Study and specialized knowledge of the law give a man a rank apart in society and make lawyers a somewhat privileged intellectual class. The exercise of their profession daily reminds them of this superiority... they serve as arbiters between the citizens; and the habit of directing the blind passions of the litigants towards the objective gives them a certain scorn for the judgment of the crowd... so, hidden at the bottom of a lawyer's soul one finds some of the tastes and habits of an aristocracy.  Under all free governments, of whatever sort, one finds lawyers in the leading ranks of all the parties. The same remark is also applies to the aristocracy. Almost all democratic movements that have shaken the world have been directed by noblemen."

    What do these aristocratic institutions have in common? What they come down to is first of all, that they provide people with a home away from the crowd, that they are a residence of specialized knowledge (legal profession, and probably true for any man learned in public affairs), of a special feeling of peaceful order (family), or of a special feeling for space and time (property), or a special feeling for an order that goes beyond the material world (religion). All these institutions have in common that they provide an order that transcends the order of secular, economic and political equality, as it is entailed in today's liberal democratic (postmodern) order. Secondly, aristocratic orders provide a sense of hierarchy  over the immediate, unmediated presence of the democratic jostling. In contrast, all those who run through the underwood of the mind, or roam the plain green abundant meadows of democracy in search for "nothing but the good things of this world"  are bound to remain restless less they transcend the universally equal crowd by means of an aristocratic institution. Thirdly, it cannot be stressed enough that this particular "order" does not does not set the individual apart form the crowd the way an individualist conscience does, and that particularity does not mean individualism . From this aristocratic order derives a sense of a particular place in relation to others: it is a "fixed station, one above the other, so that there is always someone above him whose protection he needs and someone below him whose help he may require", each man is "link(ed) with several of his fellows." In other words, the aristocratic institution creates particular responsibilities that draw people out of themselves and out of the loneliness of their heart - the precise opposite of individualism. Aristocratic institutions are an essential part of a larger narrative/order that transcends the democratic here and now, and provides a focus that is more constant than the democratic restlessness.