The Context of 'The Prince'

Machiavelli and the context in which he wrote The Prince

In the sixteenth century, when Niccolo Machiavelli wrote The Prince, Italy was not a unified country.  Instead, it was a collection of city-states, each with its own court and ruler, each attempting to gain power over the others.  In addition to being a place of domestic intrigue, Italy was also a battleground for the power-hungry French, the Spanish, the Germans, and the forces of the Catholic Church under the Popes (who were, in essence, as powerful as secular kings at this time).  One of the major Italian city-states, the republic of Florence, had long maintained an alliance with the French, and when Pope Julius II defeated the French in 1512,  Florence was defeated too.  Pope Julius declared that he would not agree make peace unless Florence ceased to be a republic and accepted the Medici family as their rulers.

These political developments had a serious impact on the life and career of Machiavelli.  Hardly a dyed-in-the-wool supporter of princes, Machiavelli had actually served for the past thirteen years as a counselor and diplomat for the former rulers of Florence, the anti-Medici republicans (his first book, The Discourses, presents a theory of republican government). 

When Florence fell into the hands of his princely enemies, Machiavelli narrowly escaped execution and found himself exiled instead.  Formerly a man who lived in the center of political power, Machiavelli was now unemployed and disgraced (not to mention bored!) in the countryside outside Florence.  He began to write a series of letters, begging the new Medici rulers in Florence to allow him to return to his beloved city.  He continued this unsuccessful effort for fourteen years, until his death in 1527.

We must read The Prince, written in 1513, as one of the first of the documents that Machiavelli wrote in order  to ingratiate himself with the new Florentine prince, Lorenzo de Medici.  Is Machiavelli insincere?  Is he a hypocrite?  After all, his first book declared that a republic was the ideal form of government, not a state governed by the authority of a prince.  And yet, we must note that Machiavelli never says anywhere in The Prince that he likes the notion of government by princes.  He merely states that if a country is going to be governed by a prince, particularly a new prince, he has some advice as to how that prince should rule if he wishes to be great and powerful.  In other words,

Machiavelli’s book is absolutely practical and not at all idealistic.  Leaving aside what government is “best” in an ideal world, The Prince takes for granted the presence of an authoritarian ruler, and tries to imagine how such a ruler might achieve success.  It is, of course, also entirely topical as well:  Machiavelli offers Lorenzo an expert handbook that deals with precisely the situation of Florence at the time.  He seems genuinely interested in using his political experience, as well as his wide reading in history and philosophy, to help Lorenzo be the best prince he can be.  But he also obviously expected some personal gain from the book as well –  Machiavelli clearly hoped that Lorenzo would find The Prince so helpful that he would immediately bring its author back to Florence where he could be a political counselor once again!

Unfortunately, Machiavelli’s cunning plan didn’t work.  Despite the lavish praise for Medicis and Popes that continues throughout The Prince, Lorenzo did not seem to like the book very much, and certainly never called Machiavelli back from exile.  Ironically, shortly before Machiavelli died, Charles V of France defeated the Pope and removed the Medicis from power.  Florence became a republic once again, and Machiavelli surely expected his long exile to end at last.  There was one slight problem, however:  Machiavelli had written a short book dedicated to Prince Lorenzo de Medici, advising him on how best to acquire and maintain power – not a very republican thing to do!  And so, that very book that Machiavelli had hoped would bring him back to Florence – The Prince – finally kept him away for good.

Summary of the Argument

Machiavelli perhaps wrote The Prince in an attempt to ingratiate himself with the Medici princes who had recently taken over the government of his native city, Florence, in the early sixteenth century (see the rather overstated flattery in the prefatory letter to Lorenzo de’Medici).  He intended this book to be a kind of “how-to:” a short, pithy handbook for princes who have gained power and wish to keep it.  Accordingly, it begins by dividing all governments into two kinds:  republics and “principalities” (those ruled by a “prince,” or single ruler).  Machiavelli swiftly dismisses the first kind of government as being outside the scope of his argument.  He then goes on to subdivide the latter kind.  Principalities, he writes, are of two kinds:  there are those which have been ruled by a family for a long time, and those which are newly conquered.  It is this last kind, obviously, that concerns Machiavelli most, and he spends the rest of The Prince sketching ways in which the “new prince” can acquire and maintain the greatest amount of power.

Machiavelli first considers “mixed principalities,” or new territories annexed to older ones.  The new prince of such a state, he writes, should wipe out the family of his predecessors in the, and should take care not to change the old laws –if need be, he should live there himself, and learn the customs of his new subjects, so they won’t consider him a “stranger.”   He should also set up colonies of his own men in the new lands, and should weaken any strong neighbouring enemies so that he will have no rival conquerors.  In all things, Machiavelli writes (as he does many times in the book), the new prince should not only keep an eye on present dangers, but on possible future dangers – a good example of this is the Roman rule of new provinces.

When a new prince takes over a state governed by an absolute ruler, the process of acquiring power is that much more difficult.  However, once such a kingdom is conquered, it is much easier to rule, since its subjects are used to oppression.  Darius, for instance, took over lands from Alexander the Great, and was able to rule them without fear of revolt, since his new subjects were accustomed to having no voice in government.   Republics, by contrast, are very easy for a new prince to conquer, but almost impossible for him to rule.  Once a new prince has gained control over a former republic, Machiavelli implies that he really has no choice but to destroy it entirely and rebuild it.

Machiavelli then proceeds to consider relationship between luck and skill in the gaining and keeping of power.  He introduces two key terms:  fortuna, which means “luck,” “chance,” “accident,” or “fortune,” and virtu, which means, literally, “manliness,” and which can also be defined as “skill,” “cunning,” “power,” “ability,” or “strength.”  Which is more important for a prince to have on his side?  Machiavelli suggests, over and over, that a prince is better off relying on virtu than on fortuna.   However, one of the key advantages of virtu is that it enables a prince better to exploit and master fortuna..  He will say later that fortuna e una donna (“fortune is a woman”) and must be dominated.  Here, though, he stresses the connections between fortuna and virtu as necessary for successful rule.  A prince must be able to seize opportunities through skill in what Machiavelli calls a “lucky shrewdness.” 

What kind of actions should a virtuoso (skillful) prince take?  Well, he avoids using other princes’ troops or hiring mercenaries to do his dirty work – such a reliance on outside help makes a prince the helpless victim of fortune .  He does not come into power through overt crime, nor does he allow himself to gain a reputation for cruelty – but he is able to use crime and cruelty when he needs to, carefully concealing his guilt.   A virtuoso prince will not alienate the people he governs, but he will not let the need to be loved by them take precedence over the necessity of being feared by them.   In order to maintain his power, a  prince must earn the loyalty of his subjects, and he can best do this by protecting them.  And any prince who shows himself to be strong enough to protect his subjects must also show himself to be strong enough to be feared by them – though, of course, never gratuitously cruel to them.   Above all, a virtuoso prince must acknowledge the fact that he does not live in an ideal world.  He should therefore “learn not to be good” when a particular occasion (fortuna again!) renders it more advantageous to be bad. In subsequent chapters, Machiavelli describes how a prince can break promises, commit crimes, and generally behave nastily for political advantage.  But he also insists that a prince should learn to avoid the hatred that would result from exposure of his bad behaviour.  He should instead cultivate a reputation for “goodness,” even if that reputation is false.  In other words, for Machiavelli’s prince, it’s better to look good than to be good.

According to Machiavelli, a prince learns such virtue by particular kinds of study:  first, and most importantly, the study of warfare.  He should spend lots of time strategizing, exercising, and preparing himself for battle.  Such  training makes a man more likely to achieve power through conquest, and less likely to succumb to laziness once he achieves it.   In addition, any prince who wishes to be powerful should also study histories of successful princes, in order to understand what has worked for men in the past and model his behavior on them.  In a sense, The Prince itself is a kind of history book, compiling short examples of good (and bad) rulers throughout history for the edification of its princely readers.