Machiavelli Research Paper

To evaluate Machiavelli in terms of political philosophy we don’t need to look very further since he goes by the name ‘thinker who founded the modern political philosophy’. When I look at him through political theories I see a true realist. He clearly denies morality in political action. This thought opposes another thinker’s ideas. Kant believed that the intentions were more important than the results where Machiavelli basically says end justifies the means. Machiavelli also believes in the great importance of power. He says that who has the power, has the right to command. Only through the use of power , peace and stability of a state can be achieved . Interestingly , opposed to realism he criticized the concept of authority by saying that

The reason why he cant think of anarchy as separated from coercive power is his way of seeing human nature. To sum up this discussion ; He believes that humans are selfish and evil in nature . They cannot be trusted . Only way to keep them in line and keep the peace is general is power . Power matters the most and the other concepts like anarchy , law and legitimacy are existing thanks to power. This though of human nature of course opposes many other thinkers like Locke , but supported by some like Hobbes .Similar to Machiavelli , Hobbes believed that people by nature are selfish and brutal , so he came to the conclusion that; to avoid disorder, everyone must surrender their freedom and be ruled. As we can see they have some very similar theories about the human nature and how they should be ruled. The reason to this can possibly be the environment they were living in .Machiavelli was living in a diffused and conflicted Italy which was lacking authority and needed a strong leadership .Basically the there were chaos and in these time you can see the ugliest faces of humans because they will do what they need to do to survive . And for Hobbes the situation was not very different

As the least harsh description we have Quentin Skinner’s ideas. He explained Machiavelli’s thoughts about the human nature and his advices of cruelty to the princes by saying acts can be seen reasonable through seeing them as a “last best” option. By his words ‘ Machiavelli prefers conformity to moral virtue ceteris