Machiavelli Machiavelli’s Prince (1513) has long been understood as the prototypical work in modern political theory. Usually this has meant either that Machiavelli helped to bury classical political theory and usher in an amoral modern politics or that he merely documented the radical historical and political changes taking place around him. Thus, some have confused Machiavelli with the historical forces he was recording, while others have taken his claim merely to report la verita effetuale della cosa (the actual truth of things) at face value. The Prince is the symbolic and dramatic action staged therein; it molds, interprets, and plots a history of its own making and provides the theory with which to know and master it. “No one should be surprised,” Machiavelli wrote, “if, in discussing states where both the prince and the constitution are new, I shall give the loftiest examples.” (The Prince) Machiavelli had found part of that political science in his own failed practices, part in his regretful and resentful grasp of the political realities surrounding him, and part in his hopeful and extravagant political wishes; and he fashioned the rest from his own creativity as the story unfolded. The scene and the actions thus achieved required a protagonist, and he fashioned the idea of a new prince to give them expression, and brought both into existence poetically in beautifully rendered acts of destructive creativity– the archetypal conquest of the hereditary or traditional principality (in two instances, a republic) (see chapters 5 and 9), replayed in repeated scenes by a variety of political actors through the discourse of the Prince.
The Essay on Political Influences of Constructivist Theory
There are several political influences that underlie the constructivist curriculum theory. Before the 1900s, the principles of constructivism were not very well regarded because it was generally thought that classroom instruction should be rigid and that teachers should be the sole generator of knowledge and while student’s only task in the classroom is to absorb that knowledge (Kitchener, 1986). ...
Spending years in the study of the art of the state; to be able to discuss only the art of the state; to be in or out of the workshop in which the art of the state is practiced, and taught to apprentices: what did Machiavelli mean when he claims to have applied himself to the study of the art of the state? What precisely was the subject of the art? And what kind of expertise or skill did the mastery of the art precisely entail? Was it the same as being a master of civil science or politics, or was it something different, something more or something less? These questions need to be raised, not only to understand the shades of meaning implicit in Machiavelli’s self presentation as an expert of the arte dello stato, but also to identify the intellectual project which oriented the writing of The Prince. The first observation to be made in this respect is that Machiavelli does not describe himself as an expert on politics or civil science, nor on ‘government and public administration’, nor on ‘the theory of the best governments’, nor on ‘the theory and practice of civil affairs’, to mention some of the expressions used by his contemporaries. He prefers instead to present himself as an expert on the art of the state, a choice all the more strange because, in Machiavelli’s Florence, politics, or civil science, was praised as the most noble of all intellectual endeavors, while the word ‘state’ had, as we shall see, a dubious connotation.
In early sixteenth-century Florence, public rhetoric, philosophy, and historiography were in fact still pervaded by the Aristotelian and Ciceronian interpretation of politics as the art of instituting, preserving, and reforming a respublica–that is, a community of free and equal citizens living together for the common good under the rule of law–and by the ideal of the political or civil man, understood as an upright citizen who serves the common good with justice, prudence, fortitude, and temperance. Whatever the causes, corruption destroys the fundamental principle on which civil life rests–namely, the rule of law and the priority of the common good over particular interests. Which means that corruption destroys political liberty and puts a people in a state of servitude.
The Essay on Business Political And Social Life In America
Business, Political and Social Life in America Fear, power and control are the three forces that have a tremendous influence on social, political and business life in America. Although there are a lot of examples to be found, one of the current examples is the possibility of war with Iraq. Its influence on the aforementioned areas of American life are profound and various, and both three elements ...
It is for this reason, and not because of his alleged commitment to the ideal of virtu, that Machiavelli devotes so much effort to investigating the institutional and political measures that have to be adopted to preserve the civil and free form of life and successfully to repeal tyranny and corruption, as well as to prevent the republic from falling under yet another form of lack of freedom and dependence–that is, under foreign domination. Whereas in his outline of the essential features of true civil community and his account of political liberty Machiavelli follows the conventional wisdom that humanist political theorists had built upon Roman political philosophy and Roman Law, his investigations of the constitutional and political devices that are needed to preserve and recover a civil and free community diverge in important aspects from traditional views. However, the precise content of his revisions of the conventional wisdom on civil and political life can be perceived only if we also take seriously his intellectual and ideological debt to that tradition. For Machiavelli, to avoid tyranny or license, a free and civil community must be well ordered, which means, first of all that it must respect with the utmost intransigence the principles of legal order. Even if the culprit is the most wicked man, even if he has perpetrated the most nefarious crimes against the republic, still his legal rights must be protected, if civil life has to be preserved. Machiavelli illustrates this point with the utmost briskness in his comment on the death of Appius Claudius, the chief of the Decemviri who imposed a tyranny in Rome, who was denied the right to appeal to the people. Because of the gravity of his crimes, Appius Claudius no doubt merited the severest punishment; however, Machiavelli writes, and again his wording has to be noticed, ‘it scarce accorded with civil life to violate the law, especially a law that had just been made’.
The Research paper on Civil Society Kyrgyzstan Political Democracy
Kyrgyzstan was the first of the Central Asian republics to acquire democratic institutions and aspirations after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Kyrgyzstan has been seen as the most democratically minded country in this region where authoritarian government is the norm. For the last years Kyrgyzstan has acquired reputation of country of "benevolent authoritarianism." My research seeks to reveal ...
Machiavelli’s advocacy of legal order as the fundamental basis of civil life is even more eloquent in his judgments of momentous cases that occurred under the Republic of Florence in his own times. It was a frequent practice in Florence to violate legality either by passing ad hoc statutes designed to protect the power of ruling groups and families, or by openly disregarding existing legislation. The most recurrent considerations that were put forth to justify the violation of laws and statutes were arguments based on the classical topos of necessity and expediency. In 1501, for instance, the lawyer Domenico Bonsi, a moderate Savonarolian, urged the Signoria not to be too rigorous in the observance of the laws: ‘the Signoria should be trusted, that to want certitude in everything is impossible, that affairs must be conducted according to accident and circumstance, and that one should not will the ruin of the city by always insisting on the observance of the laws’. The civic virtue which Machiavelli extols is an everyday virtue which translates into orderly fulfillment of civic obligations and abiding by the law more often then expressing itself as military velour. The republic is not the embodiment of virtue, nor is it instituted to affirm and enhance virtue; it is a civil order which needs virtue.
The difference must be noticed, for it cast the right light on the republic and civic virtue, as Machiavelli understood them both. In addition to these precepts, Machiavelli issues another fundamental piece of advice to protect the republic from corruption-namely, to uphold religion and respect, and encourage religious worship. Those princes and those republics which ‘desire to remain free from corruption’, he remarks, should above all else maintain the ceremonies of their religion incorrupt and should always hold them in veneration; there can be no surer indication of the decline of a country than to see divine worship neglected. Even if the rulers of the republic or a prince do not believe at all in God, they must none the less be sure that citizens practice religious worship. As long as their republic remains religious, it will also be ‘good and united’ (‘buona e unita’)–that is, incorrupt. Machiavelli’s advocacy of military discipline and virtue certainly does not entail that his republicanism is inspired by a fascination for conquest and predation, as has been claimed. Like that of the earlier theorists of communal self-government, his republicanism is informed by the commitment to the ideals of liberty and greatness, and he surely identifies civic greatness with, among other things, territorial expansion.
The Term Paper on Relationship Between Niccolo Machiavelli And The Powerful Medici Family
The powerful Medici family had a profound impact on a great many lives, but few to the extent of Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527). As a leading political thinker Machiavelli personally dealt with the Medici, and as a writer their influence was all the weightier, exemplified especially in The Prince and The History of Florence (Hereafter Istorie); both works in which Machiavelli paid considerable ...
However, for him territorial aggrandizement does not mean conquest and predatory expansionism. Machiavelli’s most eloquent dismissal of predatory expansionism is to be found in his account of the war that Florence, under Lorenzo the Magnificent’s leadership, waged against Volterra in 1472. To settle a controversy over the proprietorship of a alum mine, Machiavelli reports in the Florentine Histories, the Volterrans sent their spokesmen to Florence. Florentine authorities deliberated that the mine belonged to its owners, who, however, should have paid to the people of Volterra a sum of money every year. Volterra being a subject city, it was obliged to abide by the Florentines’ verdict. Instead violent tumults arose in Volterra which ultimately led to open rebellion against Florence’s domination. Bibliography Niccolo Machiavelli, The Prince, trans, and ed. George Bull (London: Penguin, 1961, 1995)..
