Secretary of Stupidity: Machiavelli

The Prince, Nicolo Machiavelli's treatise on the maintenance and adjudication of power, was the first book I was assigned to read as a political science undergrad. I'm not talking about PS101, American Government, or other low-level introductions to civics. This was my first core class. The room was filled not with engineering students or music students filling their elective requirements, but with future lawyers, politicians, and professors.

On our first day of discussion of The Prince, I glanced around the classroom to find fresh, young, ambitious faces (mostly) eager to soak in all they were being taught. I had read Machiavelli before, so i knew the context of the purpose of this book. Nevertheless, if you are interested in politics, his name acquires a certain shadowy fame even before you begin to read. It's kind of like driving a Ferrari. You've seen them on the road, everyone speaks reverentially about them, so you assume they must be great cars, even though you have never actually driven one. A reputation which precedes one's arrival creates a powerful emotional impact that is not easily dismissed. I would imagine this is also a key concept in advertising.

For those of you who have not read The Prince, Machiavelli is the one who put forth, "it is best to be both feared and loved; however, if one cannot be both it is better to be feared than loved." He also believed that, upon conquering new territory, it would be preferable to eliminate segments of the population that could not be cajoled though friendship and flattery. He also believed that the greatest moral good is a virtuous and stable state. In short, one must do whatever necessary to maintain power. To be fair, much of what Machiavelli states is true, if brutal. One must know the context of his life and read thoroughly the manuscript to gain a true appreciation for it.

So why is this important in conjunction with a bunch of 19 year-olds heralding their political futures? Well, it's not difficult to see Machiavelli's influence in our world today, even in our own government. And young students, even myself, stupid and careless in their idealism, do not often consider context when assessing the validity of a given argument.

I just can't help visualizing an extensive web of Machivellianism in our own White House. I can see copies of The Prince being handed out before policy meetings. Worse yet, I can see at least one particular frightening fellow, who's nickname rhymes with 'Dummy', sitting in a bathroom stall in the White House before a meeting, The Prince in his left hand, his penis in the other, and he's grunting, "must........have.........more.........power!!" there could be Machiavellian graffiti on the doors, like "machiavelli wuz here," or, "I love Nicolo."

If I were Master of Education, I would prefer to start off with a book more appropriate to the contradictory nature of politics. Should We Consent to be Governed by Stephen Nathanson would be a fine choice. After all, the very existence of government, especially in a society which values freedom and independence, ought to be debated. I don't want to start to ramble here, but I do not believe that government can actually cure any ills in society. It creates as many problems, if not more, than it purports to fix. "It" because government is by its existence, an enormous machine, a nation unto itself, with its own culture and mores. Try watching C-Span for ten minutes and you'll see what I mean.

Problems ultimately exist on an individual level. When you're constructing solutions on such large scales as dictated by governance, you are ignoring the fact that each individual case is unique. To say that 10% of the population suffers from mental illness, for example, does not begin to tell the story of little Johnny with bipolar disorder. This is why we ended up with a generation of Ritalin kids.

I am not particularly in favor of Republicans OR Democrats. I am more interested in political philosophy, the nature of humans, the history of politics. Anything political you read from me will likely have more to do with the processes and vices than actual policies (though i am not promising anything).