We're often appalled by how sly and dishonest many politicians are, but we shouldn't be. In moods like this, we need to remember and read the works of Niccolo Machiavelli, a late 15th century political advisor and political theorist, who argued that we shouldn't think that politicians are immoral and simply bad for lying and dissembling and maneuvering. A good politician, in Machiavelli's remarkable view, isn't one who's friendly and honest and kind. It's someone, however occasionally dark and underhand they might be, who knows how to defend, enrich and bring honour to the state, which is also an extremely important goal. Being nice may well be a virtue in general, but what citizens most need from their rulers is effectiveness, which may well call upon some darker arts.
Once we understand this basic requirement, we stand to be less disappointed and clearer about what we want from our politicians. Niccolo Machiavelli was born in Florence in 1469. His father was a lawyer, and so Machiavelli received an extensive formal education and got his first job as a secretary for the city of Florence. But soon after his appointment, Florence exploded politically and expelled the Medici family, who'd ruled it for 60 years, and suffered decades of political instability and turmoil.
As a consequence, Machiavelli experienced a series of career reversals. Over just a few decades, he went from being an important diplomat to a semi-successful general to an enemy of the state tortured and then exiled when the medici returned to power although machiavelli was rather a failed politician he can be remembered as a truly great man because of two works he wrote the prince and the discourses in them he attends to a central problem of politics then as now that it is almost impossible to be both a good politician and a good person in the traditional christian sense machiavelli proposed that the overwhelming responsibility of a good prince is to defend the state from external and internal threats to stable governance this means he must know how to fight but more importantly he must know about reputation and the management of those around him people should neither think he is soft and easy to disobey nor should they find him so cruel that he disgusts his society he should seem unapproachably strict but reasonable when machiavelli turned to the question of whether it was better for a prince to be loved or feared. He wrote that while it would theoretically be wonderful for a leader to be both loved and obeyed, a prince should always err on the side of inspiring terror, for this is ultimately what keeps people in check. Machiavelli's Christian contemporaries had suggested that princes should be merciful, peaceful, generous and tolerant. They thought that being a good politician was, in short, the same as being a good Christian.
But Machiavelli argues differently. He asked his readers to dwell on the incompatibility between Christian ethics and good governance, and particularly referred to the case of Girolamo Savonarola. Savonarola was a Dominican friar, a fervent idealistic Christian, who'd briefly come to be the ruler of Florence in 1494. He'd come to power promising to build the City of God on Earth in Florence. He'd preached against the excesses and tyranny of the Medici government, and even managed for a few months to lead Florence as a peaceful, democratic, and relatively honest state. However, Savonarola's success could not last, because, in Machiavelli's view, it was based on the weakness that always attends being good in the Christian sense.
It was not long before his regime became a threat to the corrupt Pope Alexander, whose henchmen captured and tortured Savonarola, hung him in the centre of Florence and burnt the body before the eyes of a now vengeful citizenry. This, in Machiavelli's eyes, is what tends to happen to the nice guys in politics. Rather than follow this unfortunate Christian example, Machiavelli suggested that a leader would do well to make judicious use of what he called virtu, virtue.
Machiavelli's concept of virtu for politicians involves wisdom, strategy, strength, bravery, and when necessary, ruthlessness. In fact, at one point, Machiavelli uses the deliciously paradoxical phrase criminal virtue to describe the necessary ability of leaders to be cruel in the name of the state and yet still good as leaders. Machiavelli provided some criteria for what constitutes the right occasion for a bit of criminal virtue any violence must be strictly necessary for the security of the state it must be done swiftly often at night counselled machiavelli and it shouldn't be repeated too often lest a reputation for mindless brutality builds up machiavelli gave the example of his contemporary cesare borgia whom he admired as someone who knew how to be tough but not too tough though we might question the criteria machiavelli used when cesare conquered the city of cesena he ordered one of his mercenaries Ramiro de Orco to bring order to the region, which Ramiro did through swift and brutal ways men were beheaded in front of their wives and children property was seized traitors were castrated chisore then turned on d'orco himself and had him sliced in half and placed in the public square just to remind the townspeople who the true boss was but then as machiavelli approving noted that was enough bloodshed chisely moved on to cut taxes imported some cheap grain built a theatre and organized a series of beautiful festivals to keep people from dwelling on unfortunate memories the catholic church banned machiavelli's works for two 200 years because of the force with which he had argued that being a good Christian was incompatible with being a good leader. But even for atheists and those of us who are not politicians, Machiavelli's insights are important.
He writes that we cannot be good at or for all things, not only because of our limited abilities and resources, but also because of conflicts within moral codes. Some of the fields we choose if not politics, then perhaps business or family life may require what we evasively call difficult decisions. decisions, by which we really mean ethical trade-offs. We may have to sacrifice neo-Christian visions of kindness for the sake of practical effectiveness.
We may have to lie in order to keep a relationship afloat. We may have to ignore the feelings of certain employees to keep a business going. And that, insists Machiavelli, is the price of dealing with the world as it is and not as we feel it should be. The world has continued to love and hate Machiavelli in equal measure for insisting on focusing our attention on the uncomfortable tension between two things we love and always want to have together but perhaps can't. Effectiveness and niceness.