Violence In Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince

Machiavelli’s The Prince is teaching the politically ambitious rulers how to use violence in order to secure the power as a personal end. Machiavelli advises a ruler to use violence as part of politics in order to maintain the rule but most importantly he should use violence to aim at political stability and the overall benefit of the community. In this regard, Machiavelli opposes the illicit use of political violence because he believes that ultimately that will be destructive to the user. Machiavelli’s view on political violence does seem to be strict however it distinguishes the practical and moral use of violence. The two historical figure whom Machiavelli uses models in order to explain his theories are Cesare Borgia and Agathocles. These
He is being compared to Cesare Borgia in chapter 7 and to the discussion of civil principalities in chapter 9. Agathocles is portrayed a man of “virtue of spirit and body” as well as having the “greatness of… soul” but these attributes does not qualify him to be the ruler who is virtuous. The reason for Agathocles fails to be portray the virtú is because despite his “actions of virtue” due to “his savage cruelty and inhumanity together with his infinite crimes (VIII). This illustrates that Agathocles transition in use of violence from the moderate level to excessive level to maintain the power seems to be an act that Machiavelli is against. Agathocles was born as “the son of a potter,” and he rose to through the ranks of the military in Syracuse by betraying his fellow citizens and massacring the nobility in order to establish his reign. He than appointed himself “to this position, he determined to make himself prince and to possess by force and without obligation to others.” Thus, Machiavelli makes the case that reputation is important in maintaining the power and if the ruler fails to keep the reputation clean than he can still acquire power but cannot acquire glory. In Agathocles case when looked into his action we can see that the opposite happens, he securely rules for many years “after infinite betrayals and cruelties. This gives credibility to Agathocles because the way he used
With this in mind, it is possible to observe Machiavelli’s criteria and determine violence in a practical sense. Machiavelli’s best role model for this is Cesare Borgia, he describes Cesare’s accomplishment as “ for I do not know what better teaching I could' give to a new prince than the examples of his [Borgia's] actions”. While Machiavelli describes Borgia as the kind of ruler who uses the violence well however his act when looked at it deeper shows the opposite, he seems to have abused violence. It can see by Borgia's career because it was brief, brutal and prolific. Borgia came to power through luck due to his father and through his father, Pope Alexander VI, he received help and he conquered the Romagna in the space of a few years and assembled everyone under his central power. Contrary to how Machiavelli depicts Borgia despite of the fact that he was being overly cruel and vengeful Borgia allowed the standing ministers to maintain their positions. Machiavelli through Borgia illustrates that a ruler does not have to kill lots of people and destruct the whole system to achieve and maintain power because this can be attained through moderate violence. Machiavelli goes on listing and explaining the actions that Borgia took to maintain its power which are much similar to Agathocles, some of them were; killing his opponents