Department of Humanities and Social Science

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1 Barry Stocker Department of Humanities and Social Science Faculty of Science and Letters POLITICAL THEORY. ITB 227E NOTES WEEK TWO NICCOLÒ MACHIAVELLI ( ) THE PRINCE [1513] CHAPTERS VIII TO XVII Chapter VIII Of those who have become princes through wickedness Machiavelli mentions to means by which an ordinary citizen may rise to become a prince though means which depend neither on fortune nor non virtue. One way is through wickedness. The other way is through the support of fellow citizens. As am example of a rise to power through wickedness he gives the example of Agathocles ( BCE) who became ruler of the Sicilian city of Syracuse. As Machiavelli describes, he became ruler through massacre, killing the most important citizens of the city state, and then going on to a successful period in power. Machiavelli refers to his virtue in the sense of a capacity to survive dangers, but refers to the wickedness of his means which lacks virtue. Machiavelli uses virtue to mean both a strength of character and moral goodness. He praises virtue in the first sense to some degree, even where it goes against virtue in the second sense, but does give the first sense of virtue full praise where it is tied to a complete lack of virtue in the second sense. So Agathocles did not rise through virtue and did not rise through fortune (good luck) either as his rise to power came from his own decisions and actions. Machiavelli also gives the example of a rise to power through wicked means in the Italy of his time. The comparison of modern and ancient examples is very important to his as he seeks patterns in history. This practice itself mirrors the approach of the ancient historian Plutarch (45-120, a Greek living in the Roman empire) who write a book of Lives of Noble Greeks and Romans, in which he looks at a series of parallel lives in which he has the life of a famous Greek next to the life of a famous Roman.

2 2 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 Machiavelli moves onto a more general discussion of the use of cruelty in power. He advises against constant cruelty to maintain power since at some point citizens will rebel against the constant cruelty so they can put an end to it. Cruelty should only be used by the prince seizing power by wicked means in the beginning to frighten people into obedience. Constant cruelty will push the people towards rebellion. Cruelty should not be followed by a complete switch to generosity towards the people since a short period of large benefits has less effect than a long period of modest benefits at any one time. The people will forget great benefits delivered suddenly, but will remain aware of benefits distributed gradually over time. So Machiavelli suggests that even the prince who seizes power by wicked means should use less wicked means to maintain a stable regime and should be generous to the people, but only in a prudent long term way, which fits with later comments about the dangers of bankrupting the state through too much generosity. Chapter IX Of the civil principality The civil principality is one in which an individual rises to power with the support of fellow citizens. There are two groups of people in the state, people and nobles. They are often in conflict. Where the people fears the power of the nobility and is not able to resist the nobility, they may place someone in power they believe will protect them from the nobility. If the nobility fear the power of the people and is not able to resist the people, they may place someone in power they believe will protect them from the people. It is better for a prince to rely on the people rather than the nobility, because the nobility is composed of people who regard themselves as equal with the prince and who may wish to seize power in order to be the prince. The nobility has the political experience and ability to act against the prince. The people will not act against the prince, at worst they will abandon the prince, because the people does not contain individuals who see themselves as equal with the prince and therefore able to rule in place of the prince. The people lacks the experience and ability to act against the prince in politics. So machiavelli is suggesting that the prince s regime will be more stable if resting on the common people rather than the aristocracy.

3 3 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 It is sometimes said that to rely on the people is to rely on mud. This thought is false though, because the examples given are not a prince relying on the people, but of individuals who are trying to take over the state and hope the people will support them. Machiavelli uses a famous episode from the history of the Roman Republic when the Gracchi brothers tried to take it over (2nd century BCE). The people did not rise to support them when they were in prison, but this is a different issue from a prince in power who will be supported by the people. The circumstance in which the prince is most likely to lose the support of the people is when the prince moves from a civil principality to absolute power. A civil principality in one in which magistrates (government representatives of various kinds as well as judges) govern the people and the prince appoints them (or at least approves their appointment) but stands above the everyday business they conduct. The people are used to obeying the magistrates and will not support a prince who takes power from the magistrates. In this case, Machiavelli warns princes of the dangers of creating a system of absolute personal rule rather than relying on law courts, town councils and other bodies which have some independence and are defined by laws and customs preceding that prince s rule. The prince should watch the nobility carefully. The prince should use the services of those nobles willing to work for the prince, even if they are not completely committed to the rule of that prince. They are pusillanimous (fearful) people who will not act against the prince. The prince should be suspicious of nobles who avoid government service since they may act against the prince if the prince encounters a crisis. Chapter X How the strength of all principalities should be measured A principality is strong if it can defend itself. The central aspect of that is to defend the central city. It should be properly fortified and have food stocks, as well as adequate soldiers, to withstand a siege of at least a year. It is unlikely that any rival state will be interested in attacking such a city since avoiding difficulty has a major impact human choices and actions. The prince must be willing to allow the surrounding countryside to be devastated by the enemy and not weaken city defence by leaving the city to try to prevent this. The people of the city will be unhappy to see homes and fields of fellow citizens destroyed, but these

4 4 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 attacks usually take place at the beginning of the stage. The pain of seeing this destruction is therefore brief and at the beginning of the siege (this parallels what Machiavelli says about the use of cruelty at the beginning of the prince s regime). This happens at a point when the people have not become exhausted by the siege. They will recover from this pain and be more tightly bound to the prince in wishing for victory against the cruel enemy. The cities of Germany are under an Emperor (known as the Holy Roman Emperor, as the first German emperor Charlemagne was crowned in Rome in 800 and in earlier times the Empire included Italy so could be seen as the successor to the original Roman Empire) but the cities are free, ignoring his power, according to Machiavelli because they follow the rules he has just mentioned. He is referring to the Free Imperial Cities which were directly under the Emperor in the structure of the German Empire rather than under a duke, prince or other hereditary ruler. So they were city republics, ruled by a city council, which were almost entirely independent in practice. Examples included Cologne, Hamburg and Frankfurt. It is interesting that Machiavelli s examples of how a prince should establish the independence of his territory are based on what successful republics have done. Chapter XI Of ecclesiastical principalities Here Machiavelli is referring to the Pope s territories in central Italy, the Papal states, which were taken away when a unified Italian state came into existence in the late 19th century. He might also have been thinking of Prince-Bishops in Germany, that is Bishops who were also territorial lords within the Empire. He questions the correctness of a religious leader having political power, but goes on to look at the Papal states like any other state. He points out that the short reigns of Popes (they were and are elected for life, but as they elected in old age to not live for very long after election), no more than 10 years, makes it difficult for them to establish strong rule. In particular the city of Rome was divided between two aristocratic families, the Orsini and the Colonna and had been for centuries. No Pope had been able to suppress them, and they were represented in the church at the highest level, as family members were always serving as cardinals, so their battles with each other had weakened Rome and the Papal States.

5 5 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 Chapter XII Of the various kinds of troops and mercenary soldiers Machiavelli condemns the use of mercenary troops. Mercenaries refers to professional soldiers, particularly those from abroad. Machiavelli wrote a book on military matters, The Art of War, which is still studied in military academies and so had a very serious interest in this area. As Machiavelli points out, Italian states often used mercenaries in their wars with each other, to the extend that wars between Italian states might be wars between foreign mercenary soldiers on Italian land. Mercenary soldiers are a bad thing for the state that employs them because they are unwilling to fight bravely and where mercenary armies fight each other, they hardly fight at all in reality because they do not want to die for a foreign employer. If they are successful, then their commander (a foreigner as well, who raised the mercenary army abroad and brought it to that state) will become the most powerful person in the state and is likely to take it over, as happened to some Italian states. In the ancient world Rome and Sparta (the Greek republic in the Peloponnesus) were able to defend themselves with citizen soldiers only (Machiavelli presumably mentions these two states because they were famous for being long lasting and successful in war). In Machiavelli s own time the Swiss have preserved their independence with citizen soldiers (the Swiss had the reputation of the best soldiers in Europe, Switzerland then was not at all rich and Swiss cantons had succeeded in breaking away from the rule of the German Emperors (known formally at Holy Roman Emperors). Machiavelli refers to Italy driving out the Emperors, which refers to the German (Holy Roman) Emperors who at times ruled large parts of Italy, and who lost their power in Italy in the Middle Ages. Machiavelli says that the Catholic Church in Rome used this situation to grow into a strong political power which is behind the disunity and weakness of Italians and the Italian states. The essential parts of the state are law and the military for Machiavelli. Laws and the importance of respecting laws are mentioned frequently in The Prince. Italy suffers as a whole from the dependence of Italian states on mercenary for the military functions of the state. Italians cannot defend themselves which is why the French king invaded Italy and why large parts of Italy are under foreign control.

6 6 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 Chapter XIII Of auxiliary, mixed and citizen soldiers Machiavelli makes similar points about auxiliary soldiers (foreign army units, maybe supplied by a foreign ruler, fighting as units from a particular nationality/people) as he does with mercenaries. The main difference is that auxiliaries are more likely to be soldiers, so that the danger that they undermine or take over the state when successful in war is greater than for mercenaries. The examples Machiavelli gives of the dangers of auxiliaries include the way in which (Ottoman) Turks first entered Europe. It was a consequence of civil war in what Machaivelli calls Greece, in fact the Roman Empire (as the Byzantine empire is more properly know, it was simply the continuation of the Roman Empire in the east, dominated by Greek speakers, which is why Machiavelli refers to it as Greece, based on the city of Constantinople which was already the main Roman capital before the fall of the western Empire), in the 14th century in which John Kantakouzenos became joint Emperor in 1347 after using troops of the Ottoman sultan Orhan Ghazi, who took over Thrace opposite Çanakkale as a result. Another example Machiavelli gives is of the fall of the Roman Empire referring to the fall of the western Empire in the 5th century. He refers to the large number of Goths (Germans) in the armies of the Roman Empire weakening the Roman army and taking virtue (here in the sense of admirable strength of character) from the Romans to the Goths. Machiavelli refers to this as the cause of the fall of the empire, though it was perhaps more the outcome of Roman depopulation and an influx of Goths into Roman lands, often fleeing from the Huns. Chapter XIV A prince s duty concerning military matters The primary duty of the prince is to be good in war and Machiavelli even suggests that is the only thing he should do. So the prince should go hunting frequently so that he knows the land he rules intimately and will know how to lead soldiers in ways which will make use of that knowledge. Knowledge of his own land will also give him insights in the land of other territories. When hunting he should always be thinking about how to organise and lead troops in this kind of landscape. He should read about war and imitate the greater military leaders of the past. In being prepared very thoroughly for war, the prince will be

7 7 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 better able to use fortune to his advantage (the idea of being able to push your luck in your direction is very important in Machiavelli). In suggesting that the prince should be so concerned with war, Machiavelli is pushing such a prince towards republicanism. A republic does not have to mean a state in which there is no prince or king. It has frequently meant any state in which political power is shared. If the prince s only concern is to command the armies then he has left political power to others, so allowing a republic to emerge. Chapter XV Of those things for which men, and particularly princes, are praised or blamed. Utopian texts refer to perfect republics and princes where there is no vice. However, the real world contain people who have vices and it is not possible to deal with such people by being perfectly virtuous. The prince therefore cannot be perfectly virtuous and should not try to be perfectly virtuous as this will leave him unable to defend himself or his state. The prince should simply avoid those vices that may lead to his loss of power. From this point of view minor vices (presumably what does little or no harm to other people) are not a problem and the prince can indulge in them without fear of bad consequences. The prince should avoid the more serious vices and certainly those vices which if known will threaten his rule. More is said about those vices later. Great vices are acceptable if necessary to save the state. Chapter XVI Of generosity and miserliness It is dangerous for a prince to be generous even though generosity is a virtue. The problem with generosity is the more the prince is generous now the less he can be generous in the future. Generosity towards a few if taken too far means not having anything left for the people as a whole and will make the prince unpopular. Generosity makes the prince popular for a short time and may be necessary when rising to power, but it creates expectations amongst the people that cannot be matched over time, and will harm the finances of the state and the people. The prince is safest encouraging an image of miserliness so that he can control his spending and so that people will be generous for anything they do get from the prince.

8 8 Political Theory Spring 2106 Notes 2 Chapter XVII Of cruelty and mercy, and whether it is better to be loved than feared or the contrary This is one of the chapters referred to most in constructing an image of Evil Machiavelli, as some who advocates state terror. Machiavelli does say it is better to be feared than loved, but what he is referring to is not lawless terror, except possibly in the very early stage of a prince who seizes power consolidating that power using the prime example of Cesare Borgia. Machiavelli refers to enforcing the laws firmly but properly. He is particularly concerned with examples from ancient history of generals who are firm enough in enforcing discipline to create an effective fighting force (Hannibal of Carthage and Fabius Maximus, a Roman leader of the time of the wars with Carthage) and those who are not (Scipio, a Roman general in Spain during the wars with Carthage). Scipio s armies rebelled against him because he did not enforce discipline, resulting in more suffering than if he had punished badly behaved soldiers properly in the first place. The cruelty Machiavelli is largely to do with enforcing laws and punishments fully to maintain a peaceful law following society, rather than an approach of always forgiving those who do wrong so removing all fear of punishment.