Niccolo Machiavelli’s Views on Compassion, Honesty and Liberality

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Table of Contents

Introduction
His views on compassion
His views on honesty
His views on liberality
Conclusion
Works Cited

Introduction

The history of modern states was either formed through conquest or imperialism. For example, many states in Africa came as a result of European expansionism. The main purpose of the conquest was political, economic, or social self-empowerment by the conquering states. History has recorded the world’s most powerful empires such as Roman Empire, French empire to have expanded their territories through military capability. Powerful political figures such as Napoleon, Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great possessed various political skills and mechanisms that enabled them to maintain their empires and remain in power. Many scholars and philosophers such as Plato, Aristotle, John Locke, Thomas Hobbes, and Niccolo Machiavelli studied or wrote on many issues concerning how rulers should rule their subjects. This paper is going to look at how Machiavelli gives numerous examples of flexible terms of compassion, honesty, and liberality in his demonstration of amorality as a necessity to be a successful prince. The examples of the flexibility given will demonstrate the inappropriateness nature of the examples in the role of being an effective ruler.

His views on compassion

The idea of flexibility uses the term compassion by Machiavelli who, through his experience in the management of the government, came up with controversial political ideas. He believed that effective leaders should be uncompassionate if they have to rule and maintain political power. He believed that people only became good when mistreated and that doing good to people yields low returns due to the complexity of human nature. As a result, he advised that for a leader to be effective in his governance, he should only embrace those ideas that are of his interest and not mind about other people’s interests (King 36).

Despite this approach, Machiavelli does not advocate for the mistreatment of subjects by leaders. This is especially true for those who uphold the principle of democracy in their system of government. As it is known, the principles of democracy embrace the issues of freedom of speech, equality, justice, and respect of human rights. Thus, he purports that an effective leader should not embrace a dictatorial form of governance. Such a dictatorial form of government will violate human rights and fundamental freedoms of the citizens, therefore, discouraging competitive politics in the state. Therefore leaders will become ineffective because the principles of good governance will be undermined in the sense that morality will not be the order of the day hence poor leadership leading to failed states (Skinner 68).

His views on honesty

Moreover, Machiavelli argued that political leaders were not supposed to be honest in the management of their government affairs. This clearly showed that for one to be effective he should never respect the promises he pledged to the electorate. Such a political leader who is not honest should not lack a strong reason as for why they did so and Machiavelli gave his famous quote to back the statement which states that ‘’A prince never lacks legitimate reasons to break his promise’’ (King 35). Thus Machiavelli clearly showed that the political leaders were needed to possess some leadership qualities to handle some political situations for them to remain in political power.

But he further contravenes his statement by saying that having such qualities and practicing them is harmful to the political leader. Thus he advises the leaders to do the contrary of what is required of them. For example, a political leader may not condone corruption but may defend his closest political ally implicated in the corruption scandal in the government. Therefore those leaders who embrace this notion compromise the principles of good governance thus becoming ineffective in their political leadership. This goes against the governance ethics of a government that is focused on good governance. Machiavelli further discourages political leaders from honoring the words of their mouth since such words would be measured from issues to do with justice, humanity, sincerity, religious morality by the people who are keen on following what the political leadership stated (Femia 63).

Machiavelli advised that for a political leader to be effective, he should concentrate on conquering and maintaining the new territories no matter what means he uses. This can bring honor to him by the people or add ranks in his leadership and this is highly supported by his famous quote which went like this ‘’It is not titles that honor men, but men that honor titles’’ (Bernad 26). He gave an example of a prince who preached the issue of peace and humanity but he never upheld what he was saying and in the end, he was a public enemy. This principle becomes questionable. In contemporary society, political leaders need to uphold ethics of governance such as respecting the supreme law of the land and serving the citizens who elected them. The political leaders should be of high integrity that should address the issues affecting the lives of the people who elected them without undermining the matters of national interest for their selfish industry. This can be achieved by using the right means to achieve the result without compromising the moral fabric of society. From these those leaders who may usher in the views of the Machiavellian political thinking will become inappropriate in their leadership bearing in mind that the modern world is politically cultured (Bernad 27).

His views on liberality

Finally, the flexible use of the term liberality by Machiavelli by the prince thought that for leaders to sustain their government, some liberal economic structures must be set up. He was of the view that for the government to be maintained, leaders should pave way for maintaining government expenditure. Consequently, he proposed that when the economy is shaky and weak, political rulers should not overtax the subjects beyond their capacity. He further states that as the subjects improve their economic condition taxes should be raised accordingly to enable the government to maintain the heavy expenditure associated with the maintenance of large armies like those of the Roman Empire under Emperor Julius Caesar. He stated that a prince who was too liberal on his subjects and collected low taxes perished during the war period because of inadequate funds to maintain government expenditure and maintaining the armies. Such a prince failed in his roles as an effective leader and he gives us an example of Pope Julius II who never taxed his subjects and failed militarily when he declared war on the king of France. As if not enough Pope Julius campaigned without taxing the people which also forced him To reduce the expenditure of his papacy until he was aided by the king of Spain. Machiavelli championed that the prince need to tax his citizen to protect himself from poverty. If political leaders embrace to a greater extent the views of Machiavelli concerning the tax issue without bearing in mind the economic status they may increase poverty to the masses due to over taxation. Also, they may become too corrupt hence misusing the public resources meant to develop the economy especially if the leaders have selfish interests. The leaders may end up burdening the public through heavy tax to fund their political campaigns to remain in power. The fear of poverty by the political leaders in the public may lead them into corrupt deals and this leads to inappropriate leaders who are not effective (Femia 43).

Conclusion

In conclusion, if leaders were to embrace the Machiavellian school of thought as has been discussed in the paper above, morality would be at peril. To a large extent, Machiavellian views cause controversy hence his flexible use of the terms such as honesty, liberality, and compassion propagate amorality. Therefore if leaders were to become effective, they should turn a blind eye to his views.

Works Cited

Bernad, John. Why Machiavelli Matters: A Guide to Citizenship in a Democracy. New York: Praeger, 2008. Print.

Femia, Joseph. Machiavelli Revisited. Cardiff: University of Wales Press, 2004. print.

King, Ross. Machiavelli: Philosopher of Power. New York: Harper Collins, 2004. print.

Skinner, Quentin. Visions of Politics, Volume II: Renaissance Virtues. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. print.

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Niccolo Machiavelli’s Views on Compassion, Honesty and Liberality

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