The Political Theory of Machiavelli Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words - 5

The Political Theory of Machiavelli - Essay Example It makes sense to ask a question about whether it is possible to justify his political concept and see its validity. Following the logic of Abramson, one can find two main arguments in favor of the validity of Machiavelli’s theory. The first argument assumes that Machiavelli considered his theory as useful for those rulers who tried to avoid evil because he was aware that political activity is always associated with a certain kind of cruelty and violence (location 2085). In turn, the second argument is that the philosopher developed his political concept based on the use of pagan rather than Christian morality (locations 2094 and 2101). As he saw it, in contrast to Christian ethics, pagan morality gave much more opportunities to solve an extremely important political task, namely the unification of Italy (location 2101). In general, the validity of his concept stems from the fact that it was aimed at strengthening the political power in Italy and its unification into a single country able to demonstrate a high economic and social potential. Thus, the aim of the paper is to provide two main arguments in favor of the political theory of Machiavelli. As previously noted, the negative attitude towards the political philosophy of Machiavelli is due to the fact that the philosopher justified the use of violence, abuse, lies, and deceit to gain the authority of the governor. In his famous work titled The Prince, Machiavelli suggested political leadership based on a number of principles, in particular, pursuing the aim to eliminate political opponents. One can identify a few basic principles proposed by Machiavelli in this work. Firstly, the philosopher said that the desire to seize power using violence and cruelty is rather natural.