The Alexis de Tocqueville Annual Lecture
The IEP annually stages a commemorative award ceremony to hand out the academic diplomas and distinctions attained by IEP students and which includes a keynote speech by a guest of international renown. This event represents one of the key landmarks in the academic life of the IEP. Following the guest speaker, the awards of excellence are announced before blessing and awarding the diplomas. The event is presided over by the Rector of the Catholic University of Portugal.
The de Tocqueville speakers have included such renowned figures as Alfred Stepan, (Sir) Anthony Kenny, Christopher DeMuth, George Weigel, (Lord Dacre) Hugh Trevor-Roper, James Q. Wilson, José Manuel Durão Barroso, (Sir) Martin Gilbert, Michael Novak, (Lord) Raymond Plant, Robert P. George, Timothy Garton Ash, Marc F. Plattner, Manuel Braga da Cruz, Margaret McMillan, (Sir) Noel Malcolm, Anthony O'Hear, and Aníbal Cavaco Silva.
On occasion of the de Tocqueville speech, the awards of excellence are announced for the previous academic year. The Alexis de Tocqueville award distinguishes the best final year undergraduate student from each degree program and the best master’s and doctoral degree students. The D. Henrique o Navegador award goes to students accepted onto international exchange programs. The Lord Acton excellence award is attributed to those students attaining average grades equal to or over seventeen in twenty. Furthermore, two merit study grants are also awarded to students honoured with Lord Acton awards, which provide exemption from all study fees for one academic year.
New! PALESTRA ANUAL ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE 1998-2018 | Alexis de Tocqueville Annual Lecture 1998-2018
Coord. Ana V. Martins | Preface: João Carlos Espada edited by Universidade Católica Editora
(In portuguese) - Price: 29.90€
"Essentially, the book brings together the Alexis de Tocqueville Annual Lectures, which began in 1998. These are formal ceremonies to award diplomas which are preceded by a lecture by a distinguished guest speaker and followed by a formal dinner.
The name Alexis de Tocqueville may not be widely known, but it was -and continues to be- a name that expresses with particular elegance and distinction the project dreamt by IEP-UCP: a project of university autonomy, of orderly and quiet defense of freedom, of refusal of what Tocqueville called a "sterile conflict between Old Regime and Revolution" or "perpetual oscillation between serfdom and abuse". (João Carlos Espada)