Arguably, the most Machiavellian leader to ever exist would be Joseph Stalin. He abided by three major Machiavellian methods that were stated in the Prince: the ends justifies the means, crush any opposition, and displaying a false character. Stalin had a plan for Russia and did everything in his power to achieve that plan. He wanted to transform Russia into a industrial superpower, a military superpower, and a political superpower. To achieve his goals he committed many horrible crimes against humanity. To be more specific, Stalin killed more than sixty million people during his reign. He was a selfish cold-blooded, heart less, and evil leader; human life was nothing to him. What caused him to develop such evil traits? It all started from his childhood. Born in Georgia in 1879 to a poor and highly chaotic family, Joseph Stalin did not have a easy childhood. Throughout his childhood, Stalin always felt inferior to other educated people; as a result, he grew a hate towards them. Surprisingly, at a young age Stalin was given a opportunity to study to be a priest, but later was expelled and joined a variety of radical revolutionary circles, particularly Marxist groups. Stalin then joined the central committee in 1912. After the October Revolution of 1917, Stalin entered the Soviet cabinet as a people’s commissar. Displaying excellent leadership skill, Stalin was elected general secretary of the committee. Lenin, the current leader at the time, died, which presented a great opportunity for Stalin. As Stalin started to build momentum, he allied with Bukharin and betrayed his past friends Kamenev and Zinoviev. They attempted to derail Stalin’s rise to power but failed miserably. To strengthen his power, Stalin did what The Prince taugh...
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... such as harshly suppressing any form of opposition, governing outside of moral boundaries, and possessing complete control. These three reasons alone nullifies any possible advantages to using Machiavelli’s techniques.
The Prince has had a negative influence because of his teachings and beliefs, past Machiavellianism, and modern Machiavellianism. The fact that Machiavelli has had a negative influence on history and society matters to everyone. Through the Prince, Machiavelli has influenced and promoted many of the horrific actions that have been taken by many oppressive and evil rulers throughout history. Although, evil leaders have existed well before the publication of the Prince, Machiavelli does not condemn them, but instead he advocates them. He then make it worst by making it easy for any one to follow. Machiavelli added wood to an already massive fire.
Many empirical things can often still be debated and refuted by experts, but there is a general admittance to the idea that power is the root of many evil things. In all fairness, we must admit that a many evil things can in their essence, be great. And that is one of the many theories advanced by Niccolo Machiavelli in his well-known work, The Prince. The Prince serves a dual purpose of both teaching a person how to attain power, but also how to retain it. Incredibly enough, history has proven most of Machiavelli’s findings and theories to work well, while some have failed to effectively secure power for the rulers who did, in fact try them. His work, does obviously highlight one main fact, which is, that power is a well sought-after attribute, and most who attain are willing to do whatever is necessary to keep it.
Machiavelli's realization of the penultimate import of the people is probably most significant reason his book holds so much influence on realpolitik. He writes, "it is essential for a prince to possess the good will and affections his people, otherwise he will be utterly without support in time of adversity." (Chapter 9). Clearly, Machiavelli understands the source of power within a princely republic lay with the people, whom the prince must constantly court. No other political philosopher before him had ever given much significance to those being governed. The reason that Machiavelli felt that the subjects were vital to the prince maintaining his rule was because the implications of earning the hatred and ill will of the people are dire for the political future of both the state and the prince. Of the two sources of attack the prince must fear, one is a conspiracy from within inspired by the hatred of the people (Chapter 19). Additionally, the prince must be aware that actions of his intermediaries can reflect upon himself. That is, if his army is cruel and brutish towards the people, the people will turn their hatred upon the prince, who is seen to tacitly condone the actions of the army. ...
On the other hand, some people may say that Machiavelli's ideas were for people in the past time and cannot be used in todays society.According to text 2 one of Machiavelli's quotes came up about being feared more than loved and the response to that was " A leader must build his relationship with the people upon mutual respect, more than any other thing. It is not fear or
In The Prince, Machiavelli separates ethics from politics. His approach to politics, as outlined in The Prince, is strictly practical. Machiavelli is less concerned with what is right and just, and instead with what will lead to the fortification of the government and the sustainment of power. Machiavelli believed that a ruler should use any means necessary to obtain and sustain power. He says, “…people judge by outcome. So if a ruler wins wars and holds onto power, the means he has employed will always be judged honorable, and everyone will praise them” (Machiavelli, 55). According to Machiavelli, the ends of an action justify the means (Machiavelli, 55). His motivation for these views in The Prince was the reunification of the Italian city-states (Machiavelli, 78-79). Machiavelli wanted Italy to return to its glory of the Roman Empire (Machiavelli 78-79). Some of the beliefs of Machiavelli could be perceived as evil and cruel, but he found them necessary. Machiavelli was not concerned with making people happy. His purpose was outcome and success, and in his opinion, the only way to be successful was to be realistic. These views of Machiavelli could classify him as one of the earliest modern
Machiavelli writes in The Qualities of the Prince, that it is better to be a miser and slightly disliked for a while than to be generous and be liked for a while than hated. If you’re a generous prince you can only be so for a short time before having to raise taxes and having people realize that you’re not that generous in all reality. Once a prince gets a reputation for being hated he will feel any slight unrest of his people. On the other hand if a prince is miserly from the get go he will be received gratefully when he decides to be generous. Using this quality of miserliness he has the ability to expand and defend his kingdom and be ready for any unforeseen events without having to burden his people, which, in turn leads to economic growth.
Niccolo Machiavelli lived in Florence, Italy in the 1400’s. The country of Italy was divided into city-states that had their own leaders, but all pledged alliance to their king. In time in which great leaders were needed in order to help the development of a city-state and country, Machiavelli had a theory that man needed a leader to control them. In his book The Prince, he speaks of the perfect leader.
In order for an individual for be successful in the field they so choose, they must be confident and have a vision for what exactly they aim to achieve. Without proper organization and discipline, a position of authority has the ability to weaken and diminish faster than it was originally built. Time and effort is key to a successful leadership position in today's society. If an individual's dedication is not clearly evident, they will quickly become hated by everyone - a consequence in which Machiavelli advised against. Humans remain focused primarily on their own gain and require bribery in exchange for loyalty. Machiavelli's ideas are best known today to be the basis beliefs of leaders who rule under a
As he begins to conclude, Machiavelli states that the prince: “should think about avoiding those things which make him hated and despised.” (Mach 48) Although these lack any withstanding moral values, they are effective in the sense that they better serve their purpose. Machiavelli was seeking to display a way to hold political power by any means possible not a utopian state. This may mean malicious acts, imprisonment, and torture, or it may mean the utilization of power to achieve a common good. Machiavelli doesn’t elaborate on this. He concentrates on a realistic approach towards government, as he remains concerned with the establishment and protection of power.
Machiavelli believes that a government should be very structured, controlled, and powerful. He makes it known that the only priorities of a prince are war, the institutions, and discipline. His writings describes how it is more important for a prince to be practical than moral. This is shown where he writes, "in order to maintain the state he is often obliged to act against his promise, against charity, against humanity, and against religion" (47). In addition, Machiavelli argues that a prince may have to be cunning and deceitful in order to maintain political power. He takes the stance that it is better for the prince to be feared than loved. His view of how a government should run and his unethical conduct are both early signs of dictatorship.
Although, Machiavelli argues that an ideal ruler must be cruel, feared and unjust in order to maintain power in his paper, "The Prince", this is not necessary true. An ideal ruler must be assertive, just and filled with integrity to maintain power, prestige, and the loyalty of those he governs.
It shows us that he is a realist who believes that we cannot be good all the time and if we try to study the ideal instead of focusing on reality, it will ruin us as he says “A great many men have imagined states and princedoms such as nobody ever saw or knew in the real world, and there’s such a difference between the way we ought to live and the man who neglects the real to study the ideal will learn how to accomplish his ruin” (Machiavelli 42). He is saying the prince cannot let his emotions get in the way or he will be ruined and not do his job of protecting his country well, however, he says that being bad is inevitable and that the prince ought to use this to gain authority as he says “ a prince who wants to keep his authority must learn not to be good, and use that knowledge, …, as necessity requires” (Machiavelli 42). Machiavelli tells us that he prince should steer clear of vices to the best of his ability and to practice virtue, but knows that practicing all these virtues is not possible due to the human condition, and that it is still acceptable to practice
“The Prince”, by Niccolo Machiavelli, is a series of letters written to the current ruler of Italy, Lorenzo de’ Medici. These letters are a “how-to” guide on what to do and what not to do. He uses examples to further express his views on the subject. The main purpose was to inform the reader how to effectively rule and be an acceptable Prince. Any ruler who wishes to keep absolute control of his principality must use not only wisdom and skill, but cunning and cruelness through fear rather than love. Machiavelli writes this book as his summary of all the deeds of great men.
The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli isn't about one man's ways to feed his power hungry mindset through gluttony, nor is it just explaining altercations between a nation's states. This writing is regarding to how one's self-confidence can make them become powerful in a society and also, the way morals and politics differ and can be separate in a government. Originally, Machiavelli wrote The Prince to gain support from Lorenzo de' Medici, who during the era, was governor of Florence. As meant as writing for how a society should be run, this book has been read by many peoples around the world who want to have better knowledge of the perfect stability of beliefs and politics required to run a good civilization.
To understand the writings of Niccolò Machiavelli, it is necessary to understand the world of Niccolò Machiavelli, Renaissance Italy. The region was not one nation as it is today, rather a collection of several city-states, which contained internal fighting between powerful families, fighting with each other. This era differed from the preceding middle ages in many respects, the pope's power was weakened, money controlled power instead of noble birth, and there was a revival of ancient Greek and Roman literature, architecture and art by a new breed of people, the humanists. These changes created the environment in which Machiavelli lived. He saw how the quarrelling was weakeni...
Machiavelli understands the importance of a military force, and that a country has to be kept in order, even if that means lying to the people to get them to fight against a common foe. In Europe, the church was entangled in politics, and everything else, but Machiavelli suggests a secular state, which would allow the leader to do that which is necessary for the country and for his continued reign, though not necessarily moral.The ends do not justify the means, yet sometimes if the end is necessary for the continuation of a society, then the means do not have to be morally bound. A ruler cannot please everybody all the time, so therefore, he has to be cunning in order to maintain control. There are times when a ruler needs to lie to the populace, in order to reach a goal that is better in some way for the nation. By tying the church to the government, people expected the government to behave morally, but often times, an entirely moral ruler will be overthrown.