Written in a few weeks, Niccolo Machiavelli’s Prince is certainly one of the most misinterpreted books in Political Science. It is indeed unfortunate that many people have understood it simply as a treaty on how to keep power at all costs1 while many others have read it as an evil book that teaches rulers how to deceive others. Its aim is far more ambitious than these mere intents and must rather be interpreted as a treaty about the common good and collective freedom. While other authors who preceded him also emphasized these concerns in their works, Machiavelli’s originality lies in the main premise at the core of his investigation which marked a revolution in the field of Political Science. Indeed, Machiavelli is the first political theorist who openly built his theory on the way human beings truly behave with one another, which played a major role in his understanding of the objectives that ought to be pursued by societies and in his advices on how societies should be ruled and organized. His intention to propose a new understanding of politics was famously claimed in chapter 15 of the Prince in which he wrote:
It remains now to see what ought to be the rules of conduct for a Prince towards subject and friends. And as I know that many have written on this point, I expect I shall be considered presumptuous in mentioning it again, especially as in discussing it I shall depart from the methods of other people.
This is the reason why Leo Strauss has considered Machiavelli as the founder of modern political philosophy by stepping away from the ancient way of thinking of Plato and Aristotle in order to create a brand new assessment of politics by refusing to put morality at the center of his understanding of this type of collective action.2 This clear and explicit revolutionary desire on the part of Machiavelli has led many individuals to misinterpret his work. Granted: it is true that Machiavelli’s new approach has led him to celebrate immoral deeds in the sphere of politics, which is why common opinion now considers him as “a teacher of evil”3 whose Prince was written with Satan’s fingers4 and why his name is now a synonym of all diabolical actions. This interpretation is reinforced by the fact that many evil actions or dictators have been closely associated with Machiavelli. For instance, we know that Mussolini has sent a copy of the Prince with a handwritten note to Hitler5 and that Catherine de Médicis apparently read it before ordering the St. Bartholomew’s Massacre. This view on Machiavellianism has expanded beyond the world of politics and has led the business literature to define those who are willing to exploit and oppress others as having a “Machiavellian” personality.6 Such an appraisal is easy to understand, since Machiavelli did not hesitate to tell political leaders to kill their enemies and their family members or to execute their friends on the market square. His desire to rethink the way we ought to understand politics is also marked by his use of a new rhetoric, namely his notion of “virtu” that has nothing to do with the commonly used concept of virtue. While the latter refers to honesty, magnanimity and other similar higher moral actions, Machiavelli rather redefined the notion as being in part synonymous with immoral deeds. In this sense, and compared with ancient political philosophers, it is clear that Machiavelli’s work has marked a breaking point and that he has influenced his successors—such as Thomas Hobbes—who did not hesitate to advocate the same ideas about human nature. With Machiavelli, the desire to think of societies as a way to realize higher moral ends was abandoned in favor of more down to earth objectives that are in line with human passions. Immorality became for the first time a fundamental part of the way we must understand the foundation and the structure of societies.
Despite these explicit calls to act immorally, it would however be a mistake to summarize Machiavelli’s conception of politics as being an activity that is exclusively limited to murders, treasons and attempts to usurp power. While his conception of “virtu” can mean that a Prince may have to kill a political enemy, it may also require a Prince to show mercy if this will lead to better outcomes for his society. This is why, it is important to go beyond Machiavelli’s theory of means as it is simply a tool at the service of a higher objective that ought to be sought by all societies, namely peace, order and a capacity to allow their citizens to remain free. This is why, the Machiavellian conception of “virtu” is amoral rather than immoral, as it is clearly exposed in chapter 15 of the Prince.7 If posing a moral action—like showing mercy or forgiving an enemy of the state—will be the best way to reach these state’s objectives, then the Prince should not hesitate to act morally. On the other hand, if an immoral action will be the best way to maintain peace, stability and civic freedom, then the Prince should act accordingly. These precisions about the nature of Machiavelli’s “virtu” are well known and have already been discussed at length by renowned scholars like Leo Strauss or Quentin Skinner.
However, another source of confusion about Machiavelli’s book still has not been sufficiently addressed, namely the meaning of a “Prince” in our democratic era. Indeed, we can wonder what is the relevance of an autocratic figure in a world that now values shared-governance and an active citizenry. So, does it mean that the figure of a Machiavellian Prince is now anachronistic and that the only relevance of the book for political scientists of the twenty-first century solely lies with its understanding of the role of morality in politics and the objective that ought to be sought by politicians? As this book will suggest, this would be a mistake to ignore the contemporary relevance of the Prince since the concentration of power in the hands of one man can still be necessary in a democratic context. Machiavelli’s theory remains today as relevant as it was in 1513. Indeed, even if it now agreed by most scholars that Machiavelli’s preferred regime was a republic organized around a well-ordered constitution that favored the political involvement of the people, he nonetheless agreed that the rule of one man was an appropriate solution in the case of two exceptional circumstances.8 As it has been summarized adequately by Erica Benner,9 the first circumstance may be for the sake of establishing a new city, while the other scenario is when a free society is about to collapse. In this latter case, if an entrepreneurial ruler able to prevent this situation from happening ought to arise, then Machiavelli agreed that granting him with “an almost kingly power” may very well be the best possible option to envisage. But, like it has been argued by Raymond Aron, this form of tyranny should not be equated with those of Hitler, Mussolini or Stalin. It is rather a form of rule that resembles the one that was commonly given to dictators under the Roman Republic, namely a temporary power for the sake of preserving the state and its institutions.
One way that will allow Machiavelli’s interprets to have a better understanding of what a Prince can resemble today is to re-write this classic of political theory by offering new examples and relying on famous contemporary Princes who have acted in accordance with Machiavelli’s teaching. Instead of focusing on the now largely unknown figures of Cesare Borgia, Francesco Sforza and Agathocles, this book will rather refer to contemporary characters, such as Charles de Gaulle, Muammar Gaddafi, Lee Kwan Yew and Nursultan Nazarbayev in order to highlight the significance of today’s Princes, when they may be required and the kind of actions they ought to use. My hope is that this re-writing will be as faithful as possible to the original text in a way that will allow contemporary readers to have a better understanding of the advices Machiavelli gave more than 500 years ago and how they can now be applied through the use of political leaders that people of today are more familiar with.
Jean-François Caron
Nur-Sultan, July 2019
Footnotes
1
This is clearly Dick Morris’ short-sighted interpretation of Machiavelli’s book. See The New Prince: Machiavelli Updated for the Twenty-First Century. New York: St. Martin’s Griffin, 1999.
2
Leo Strauss, What is Political Philosophy? And Other Studies. Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 1988, p. 40.
3
Leo Strauss, Thoughts on Machiavelli. Chicago and London: Chicago University Press, 1958, pp. 9–10.
4
Claude Lefort, Machiavel, le travail et l’œuvre. Paris: Gallimard, 1972, pp. 85–92.
5
Éric Weil, “Machiavel aujourd’hui”, Critique, Vol. 8, No. 46, March 1951, pp. 233–253.
6
Indeed, “Machiavellianism is included as one of the three personality traits collectively referred to as the ‘dark triad’. Within the management literature, scholars group Machiavellianism, narcissism and psychopathy together as the ‘dark triad’ given all three personality traits share the common thread of malevolence demonstrated within interpersonal relationships. An individual displaying Machiavellianism generally exhibits three interrelated values that drive behavior: (1) an openness to using manipulation to bring about desired results; (2) a distrustful view of others; and (3) prioritizing results above morality (i.e., the ends justify th...