Who was Niccolò Machiavelli?
For fourteen years, from 1498, Niccolò Machiavelli worked as a senior official in the Republic of Florence, handling diplomacy and military matters. In 1512 the Medici returned and he lost his post. He was jailed, tortured and let go, and he then lived on a farm near San Casciano. His best-known books came out of that exile. The Prince dates from 1513, and he also produced the Discourses on Livy, The Art of War and a history of Florence. Many treat him as a hinge in Western thought, because he described how states and rulers actually win and lose power, not how they ought to act.
Political views
- He said a ruler must be ready to break the usual moral rules if the survival of the state depends on it.Source: plato.stanford.edu
- If a ruler cannot be both loved and feared, he held, fear is the safer choice, as long as the ruler avoids being hated.Source: gutenberg.org
- In the Discourses he admired the Roman Republic and argued that a mixed government, with the people taking part, lasts longer than rule by one man.Source: iep.utm.edu
- In 1505-1506 he helped set up a Florentine citizen militia, so the republic would not have to rely on foreign or hired soldiers.Source: iep.utm.edu
- The last chapter of The Prince appeals for a strong leader who can unite Italy and drive out foreign rulers.Source: gutenberg.org
- He thought religion helped bind a community together, but blamed the Church for keeping Italy politically divided.Source: plato.stanford.edu
- For him, a successful ruler's virtù was a flexible quality: the skill to switch between good and evil conduct as events and necessity demanded.Source: plato.stanford.edu
Legacy
'Machiavellian' became a word for sly and unprincipled, and for centuries critics read The Prince as a guide for tyrants. The Catholic Church banned his writings by placing them on its Index. A few readers, Spinoza and Rousseau among them, argued that the book was really revealing how princes behave. Many modern scholars say he began a hard-headed, evidence-based study of politics, and republican thinkers like Quentin Skinner and Philip Pettit build on his Discourses. People still disagree on whether he cared more about liberty or about power.
In their own words
“It is much safer to be feared than loved, when, of the two, either must be dispensed with.”