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Posted by bilothman on March 13, 2009
Please comment and give me honest feedback- don’t hold back your criticism, no matter how harsh it is.
Chapter VI: About New Princedoms Acquired with One’s Own Arms and Energy [Virtù]
Page 17
“And it is worth noting that nothing is harder to manage, more risky in the undertaking, or more doubtful of success, than to set up as the introducer of a new order. Such an innovator has as enemies all the people who were doing well under the old order, and only half-hearted defenders in those who hope to profit from the new. This half-heartedness derives partly from fear of opponents, who have the law on their side, and partly from human skepticism, since men don’t really believe in anything new until they have solid experience of it. The is why, whenever the enemies of a new state have occasion to attack it, they do so furiously, while its friends only languidly come to its defense, so that the venture and its supporters are likely to collapse together…it is the nature of people to be fickle; to persuade them of something is easy, but to make them stand fast in that conviction is hard. Hence things must be arranged so that when they no longer believe they can be compelled to believe by force.”
In The Prince Machiavelli makes conjectures about general rules governing the behavior of people. He characterizes them as selfish and animalistic; motivated only by pleasure and pain. Upon these conclusions, like the above passage, Machiavelli has often been criticized- especially when The Prince was published. In the 16th century the Catholic Church told humans to be selfless, charitable and obedient to God. This view was in stark opposition to Machiavelli’s treatise. Interestingly the power of the Church has waned through the centuries, but Machiavelli’s ideas have flourished. His assumptions, like the one above, are eerily accurate.
This analysis of human behavior focuses on change- a topic very important to a prince or politician. As power is transferred from one faction to another the complications that follow need to be minimized to ensure the transfer is a smooth one. In other words the new leader must be able to maintain political stability. This accomplishment is very difficult for the reasons Machiavelli describes. Change itself is something that people resist. It is often difficult because new people must adapt to new roles, and those who stand to gain power will be skeptical, slowly easing into their new role, while those who stand to lose power will fiercely defend their status. From this conjecture the reader can conclude people take greater measures to avoid pain than to achieve pleasure. They can deal with almost any situation as long as they know what to expect so they can plan accordingly. What people don’t like, according to Machiavelli, is change. Its outcome can never be exactly predicted.
This concept is one Machiavelli echoes throughout The Prince. All of his advice pertaining to how Princes should acquire new lands is all based on minimizing pain placed on the citizens. One example Machiavelli cites is in chapter II, where he notes taking over a hereditary principality is easy, as long as the new prince does not upset established customs or change the lives of the citizens. Another is in chapter VIII, where Machiavelli advises prince who obtained power through the use of crime. He alludes to Agotholes of Syracuse who became military governor by murdering the city’s senate and wealthiest citizens. This may seem like a monumental change, but consider what Agothocles did afterward: he successfully defended Syracuse from the Carthaginians, launched a successful invasion of North Africa and after that committed no atrocious acts; in fact after he committed the murders he governed Syracuse well until his death in 289 B.C. No one rebelled against him because he created change only once. After that he allowed his citizens to live how they wished. By limiting the political change created by his rise to power, Agothocles successfully kept his power and Syracuse stable.
People are so mistrusting of change (they fear they will end up worse than what they already are) that they will subject themselves to the rule of a man like Agothocles. In fact they will allow almost anyone to rule over them as long as that person creates a stable environment in which they can be safe in knowing what to expect. In history, as well as modern times people have rallied behind leaders not because of their virtuous characters, but because of their ability to create a stable environment. Take Adolf Hitler- very few would seriously argue he possessed good character, but at the time he created steady jobs and therefore a stable environment for thousands of Germans. He rescued a faltering German economy faced with inflation and recession. Those are the things the German’s valued in Hitler- he created order and stability where chaos and poverty had once been.
Machiavelli reasoning goes even further than this. He reasoned people’ fear of loss made them reluctant to support a regime change because they don’t know whether the new regime will place them in a better or worse position than they were before. Logically his conclusion makes sense: why would a person support a new regime if it were destined to fail? The safe choice is always supporting the already established one; even if it is oppressive, the citizen will at least know what to expect. Idealists would disagree with this conclusion because it discredits new regimes that successfully take over the old ones. Machiavelli however takes a very practical stance: because the majority of rebellions fail, it is a safer for a citizen to side with the established government than risk injuring it, and consequently being convicted of treason.
If one wants to overthrow a government Machiavelli advises invoking idealism to take over the old regime, then when the idealists discover the new regime will be no better than the old, make laws that force those idealists to comply with the new regime. This again is a great example of Machiavelli’s practicality. His advice is far from idealistic, but a thousand times more practical; and because of its practicality, it can- if followed- achieve the desired results.
This passage is just one of many that set up sound logic against idealism. In this battle Machiavelli will argue that practicality always wins. People naturally resist change, so why should they support it? It causes trouble more often than not. What they do like is repetition and stability. They are the two things a Prince should aim to create because they are the most practical when governing. Machiavelli’s advice in this passage reflects the practicality he champions throughout The Prince.
