Plato, Machiavelli and machiavellism

Abstract

Throughout this paper the author questions Machiavelli’s Machiavellism, i.e. the position that Machiavelli’s political theory takes stance of immoralism. The first part of the paper compares Plato’s and Machiavelli’s political philosophy, analyzing differences as well as similarities between these two philosophers. Author finds Plato’s views on politics and political community more malignant than Machiavelli’s. Machiavelli’s views on politics, state, laws and liberty are in fact closer to the basic principles of liberalism then to the tenets of tyranny or totalitarianism. The second part of the paper deals with the concept of the autonomy of politics and the use of cruelties and evils as the instruments of rule in Machiavelli’s work. In this part of the paper, author denies that Machiavelli was the philosopher of evil or the proponent of political gangsterism.

Keywords

• human nature
• good
• evil
• laws
• liberty
• machiavellism