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By lm (Sun Mar 27, 2005 at 10:42:52 AM EST) (all tags)

The need for a Machiavellian hypothesis

One of the most pertinent questions regarding any political philosophy from days gone by is the question of whether or not it is still applicable. This question, however, can only be answered if there is some fashion in which applicability can ascertained. The question of whether or not the applicability of a given political theory can be determined in some fashion is a question that is all too easily overlooked, but one that is imperative to examining if a political theory is still applicable. In some ways, answering this second question has become easier in the post modern era where the field of politics has come to be seen as a science in which the relations between causes are quantifiable and can be evaluated on an empirical level. This transition of viewing the field of politics as a science implies that one way of determining the applicability of a political theory is to attempt to derive a scientific hypothesis from the theory in question. Toward that end, this paper will examine whether or not a scientific hypothesis can be derived from Niccolo Machiavelli's political philosophy as represented in The Prince.


Machiavelli himself suggests that the truth of his political philosophy was inextricably tied to the way that it yields particular and practical results. Machiavelli seemed to care little about proving that his political theories were universally true. Consequently, instead of attempting to construct an ideal imaginary principate as the ancient philosophers had done, Machiavelli observes that it is ``more profitable to go behind to the effectual truth of the thing, than to the imagination thereof'' (Machiavelli, N. The Prince. Translated by Alvarez, L.P. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, 1989. p. 93). By effectual truth, Machiavelli meant truth that yielded practical results in the acquisition of one's desires, which for a prince is the acquisition of political power. Machiavelli's ideas, then, only have value as political theories inasmuch as they are pragmatically useful and consistently yield practical results.

One way of ascertaining that a theory leads to consistent and repeatable results is to formulate it into a scientific hypothesis which can then be empirically tested. While there are other methods of examining truth, when it comes to practical consequences, a falsifiable hypothesis is the best way to proceed. Without a mechanism akin to a falsifiable hypothesis, tying practical results to a particular theory is very difficult. This is especially the case for a theory that emphasizes effectual truth. If a set of actions are supposed to yield particular results, then it must be possible to demonstrate the connection between those actions as a cause and the alleged consequences of those actions as an effect. Hence, the remainder of this paper will be spent examining the basic components of Machiavelli's political theories in order to develop a testable scientific hypothesis.

Building blocks of a Machiavellian theory of acquisition

The are two fundamental building blocks to Machiavelli's theory of acquisition. The first building block is the tenet that the only truth that matters is effectual truth, truth that leads to practical results when acted upon in particular circumstances, rather than general truths. Machiavelli rejects general truths on the basis of the lack of any meaningful distinction between nature and convention, suggesting that without this distinction nature has no purposiveness in and of itself and consequently does not contain any general truths. In the absence of any meaningful general truths, Machiavelli suggests his readers turn to effectual truths which provide value in various specific circumstances, giving various examples of this type of truth.

Machiavelli equates the natural prince with the hereditary prince whose sole distinction from other princes (e.g. those princes who come to power through the will of the people, by conquest, or by wickedness) is ``in the antiquity and continuity of the dominion'' in which ``the memories and causes for innovations extinguished''.1 By equating the defining characteristic of what is natural with long standing convention, Machiavelli is implying that there is no true distinction between nature and convention. If there is no inherent distinction between nature and convention, it follows that any purposiveness that might be in nature is there only by convention, by various human beings ascribing meaning and purposiveness to nature. One of the most important consequences of this view is that there are no general truths as general truths are nothing other than meanings projected onto nature by various peoples.

Because he sees general truths as projections of meaning onto nature, Machiavelli sees little or no value in them, categorizing them as idealistic imaginings. Instead, he focuses on looking for particular truths which are helpful in specific sets of circumstances. Speaking of the ideal states imagined by various philosophers before him he states bluntly ``since it is my intention to write a useful thing for him who understands, it seemed to me more profitable to go behind to the effectual truth of the thing, than to the imagination thereof''.2 What is useful, for Machiavelli, is not a set of general truths, but a set of particular truths that help a prince determine the proper course of action in specific circumstances.

Machiavelli gives several examples of the sorts of particular truths he is interested in: geographical information regarding one's dominion, techniques of military strategy, and physical endurance.3 Machiavelli seems to only be interested in forms of knowledge that allow one to achieve some concrete goal concerning the acquisition of what one desires. In this particular case, Machiavelli is speaking specifically of the desire of a prince is to acquire or maintain a principate, but this desire to acquire can extend to other areas. The important implication is that, in light of absence of any utility in general truths, the only knowledge that has value are those particular truths that aid one in acquiring what one desires.

The second building block is that particular knowledge leads to acquisition unless stymied by fortune because of natural desire to acquire present in all human persons. The desire to acquire, when combined with practical knowledge, leads to the imposition of the will of individuals on others in order to acquire. This process of acquiring through the imposition of will is guided by both virtue and fortune as illustrated by Machiavelli by several historical anecdotes.

Machiavelli points out that the desire to acquire is both natural and ordinary for the human person. In fact, he goes further and states that when human beings are able to acquire, other people invariably give them accolades and that the only thing blameworthy with regard to the desire to acquire is to be ``not able and yet want to do so''.4 Humans as a species tend to only blame the inability to acquire objects of desire because the desire to acquire is a natural and ordinary part of the human person.

If the desire to acquire is normal, as Machiavelli suggests, then it follows that the human person should take steps to make oneself virtuous, to have the ability to acquire one's desires. The first step in making oneself able to acquire one's desires is to train oneself to be proficient in both weapons of war and knowledge. A person who is armed is always able to impose his or her will on others who are unarmed, ``[f]or between someone who is armed and someone who is unarmed, there is no proportion whatsoever; and it is not reasonable that he who is armed willingly obeys him who is unarmed.''5 But one does not merely arm oneself with weapons. One also arms oneself with knowledge of particulars so that in any specific circumstance, one will have the prudence to choose the correct course of action to lead to the acquisition of one's desires.

Aside from arming oneself with the knowledge of particulars, a person also needs to have the ability to capitalize on those particulars, which is virtue, and good fortune in order to acquire one's desires. Because there are no universal truths in Machiavelli's world, virtue, the ability to acquire the objects of one's desires, cannot be based on a universal truth. Rather, virtue can only refer to particular abilities used for the pursuit of particular desires. Hence, it becomes apparent that no one deserves to acquire the objects of his or her desires. Instead, those who have armed themselves with knowledge, ability and prudence are the ones who acquire their desires unless stymied by fortune.

Machiavelli gives two illustrations with regard to the role of fortune: ancient Rome and Cesare Borgia. He holds up the ancient Romans as exemplars of his ideas in that they prepared for not only current contingencies, but also prepared for every future contingency that fortune might throw at them in the future.6 By anticipating future possibilities, the Romans were not only exercising their virtue and prudence, but they were taking steps to make certain that fortune did not rob them of their prize. Borgia, on the other hand, succumbed to fortune through no fault of his own. Machiavelli states bluntly that he doesn't know how to find fault with Borgia's actions.7 But despite Borgia's displays of virtue and prudence, the untimely death of his father at a time when Borgia himself was bedridden from illness proved to be his undoing. No matter what precautions one takes, then, fortune can overcome one's best preparations.

The Machiavellian hypothesis of acquisition

The building blocks above give rise to a Machiavellian hypothesis of political science: if a person who has virtue is not inhibited by fortune, then that person will tend to succeed in the acquisition of his or her desires. This formulation has two apparent difficulties. The first is that it appears to be tautological: if virtue is the ability to acquire the Machiavellian hypothesis appears to be that those who have the ability to acquire do acquire. The second is that the role of fortune appears to make the hypothesis unfalsifiable. Both of these criticisms, however, can be resolved.

Machiavelli's political theory is much more subtle that mere observation that those who have the ability to acquire the object of their desires do acquire the object of their desires. This subtlety comes from the role that fortune plays in the hypothesis. On the one hand, fortune can grant the objects of desire to a person with no virtue. On the other hand, fortune can prevent a person with virtue from the acquisition of his or her desires. This observation is, perhaps, one of the largest contributions Machiavelli made to political theory: the separation of deserving to acquire one's desires (through being virtuous in either Machiavelli's sense or in a more traditional sense) from the fact of whether or not one does acquire the objects of one's desires.

This role of fortune, however, leads to the second apparent criticism of the hypothesis being unfalsifiable. One could argue that Machiavelli's could not know whether or not his beloved Romans were in fact virtuous at all. Fortune may have given the ancient Romans their empire despite their lack of virtue rather than Machiavelli's assertion that they gained their empire through the virtue. Similarly, in Machiavelli's example of Borgia's defeat discussed above, one can argue that it was his lack of virtue -not the intervention of fortune- that caused his downfall, but one can never know for certain. It would seem that fortune's role makes Machiavelli's theory untestable.

This criticism, however, misunderstands fortune's role in Machiavelli's writing as he holds while fortune is in a certain sense unavoidable, it is also not all encompassing. Machiavelli suggested that the consequences of a person's actions are probably half determined by his or her own autonomy and half determined by fortune.8 Virtue does not guarantee the acquisitions of one's desires, but neither does fortune inorexably determine the outcome of one's attempts at acquisition. If one has virtue guided by prudence, one may very well overcome a good many of the obstacles that fortune puts in one's path while a person who lacked virtue would gain nothing. Virtue, then, results in a tendency to acquire that exceeds the tendency of the non-virtuous because the virtuous are able to overcome fortune more frequently. Consequently, the Machiavellian hypothesis predicts that virtue quantitatively overcomes fortune and therefore can be scientifically tested.

Whether Machiavelli was correct in his supposition that the desire to acquire is natural and ordinary is still a question that is open to dispute as is the political theory that Machiavelli built around that supposition. It is demonstrable, however, that this question is in principle one that can be investigated through the scientific method and one that, therefore, is potentially useful in the realm of political science and not merely as an artifact of the history of philosophy.

... extinguished''.1
Ibid., p. 9.
... thereof''.2
Ibid., p. 93.
... endurance.3
Ibid., p. 89.
... so''.4
Ibid., p. 18.
... unarmed.''5
Ibid., p. 88.
... future.6
Ibid., p. 15.
... actions.7
Ibid., p. 47.
... fortune.8
Ibid., p. 146.
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Constructing a Machiavellian Political Hypothesis | 23 comments (23 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback
Ahem. A translation, by spcmanspiff. by spcmanspiff (2.00 / 0) #1 Sun Mar 27, 2005 at 09:53:24 PM EST
Does historical political philosophy actually matter in current politics? How can we tell?

If we answer the second question, we can then answer the first.

POST MODERNISM!!!!!

Perhaps we can test a political theory by constructing a hypothesis around it following the scientific method. Let's try it in this paper with Machiavelli's The Prince!

Okay, that wasn't fair. But you must admit that it's an easy target...



PoMo is quackery by lm (2.00 / 0) #2 Mon Mar 28, 2005 at 05:10:34 AM EST
Any other pot shots you'd like to take?
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

Disagree... by spcmanspiff (2.00 / 0) #3 Mon Mar 28, 2005 at 09:04:04 AM EST
PoMo is an enabler of a great deal of quackery, but I'm not sure the thing itself, whatever it may be, is actual quackery.

The only reason I made it so prominent is that it seemed more than a bit incongruent with the rest of your paper (for example, the introduction is the only place where the words "post" or "modern" even appear according to a quick search). Also that, in my admittedly very limited understanding, postmodernism often seems to be an explicit rejection of "quantify everything" types of thinking.

Anyway, I do apologize for the earlier potshot -- was at the office late on a Sunday night, and looking for distractions, so don't take it personally.

[ Parent ]

What I was getting at by lm (2.00 / 0) #4 Mon Mar 28, 2005 at 10:17:04 AM EST
And what I probably wasn't precisely clear about is that political philosophy is widely ignored. What presently matters to most politicians in the present era is political science. And don't feel bad that I dismiss Post Modern philosophy as quackery. It follows on the heels of Modern philosophy which was also quackery.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

Ah, check that. by spcmanspiff (2.00 / 0) #5 Mon Mar 28, 2005 at 11:02:57 AM EST
Political philosophy is for revolutionaries; political science is for politicians.

Couldn't agree more.

[ Parent ]

Politics is no more a science than economics by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #6 Tue Mar 29, 2005 at 04:11:41 AM EST
Elements of either academic discipline may be pseudo-scientific but real world repeatable experiments are hard to come by.

And in what sense are you two throwing the term postmodern around? Let's define postmodernism before we attack or defend it shall we?

[ Parent ]

Define postmodernism? by lm (2.00 / 0) #7 Tue Mar 29, 2005 at 04:17:26 AM EST
That would be a very unpostmodern thing to do. ;)
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

That may be true for you... by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #8 Tue Mar 29, 2005 at 04:34:23 AM EST


[ Parent ]

If it makes you feel better by lm (2.00 / 0) #9 Tue Mar 29, 2005 at 02:09:18 PM EST
Postmodernism, with regards to philosophy, is usually categorized as the philosophical movement that arose in that nineteenth and twentieth centuries as a response to modern philosophies that triggered the Enlightenment which were characterized by a strict adherence to quantifiable knowledge and geometric certainty. (Modern philosophy is characterized by the likes of Descartes, Bacon, Spinoza, Hobbes, Hegel, Marx, etc.) Postmodernism, typified by the thinkers such as Nietzsche and Diderot, tends to reject that any meaning is possible or, if possible, irrelevant to any meaningful discourse.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

rejecting the possibility of meaning by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #10 Wed Mar 30, 2005 at 12:36:05 AM EST
or rejecting any universal concept of meaning and truth? If the latter then it sounds like the dreaded relativism.

Did you mean Diderot? I suspect you meant Derrida as Diderot was pretty central to the enlightenment and died in the 18th century IIRC.

[ Parent ]

Yeah, I meant Derrida by lm (2.00 / 0) #11 Wed Mar 30, 2005 at 06:30:20 AM EST
A good deal of po mo philosophers attacked the idea of meaning itself. Nietzsche, as one example, not only that that human individuals projected their own meaning onto existence, he struggled over whether or not what was being projected was actually meaning and leaned towards considering it to simply be what is rather than actual meaning.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

maybe I need 'meaning' explained then by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #12 Wed Mar 30, 2005 at 08:05:22 AM EST
It seems pretty trivial to demonstrate that meaning can be separate from the world 'out there' by pointing to conflicting meanings or meanings that can not directly correlate to anything physical.

[ Parent ]

po mo strikes again by lm (2.00 / 0) #13 Wed Mar 30, 2005 at 12:30:26 PM EST
``It seems pretty trivial to demonstrate that meaning can be separate from the world 'out there' by pointing to conflicting meanings or meanings that can not directly correlate to anything physical.'' But can you prove that understanding of meaning is universal and, if so, can you prove that a common understanding of meaning does not refute the very idea that you suggest? If Nietzsche is correct and there is no real meaning, but only what is, how could you prove anything, let alone the implications of the different understandings of meanings?
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

Prove anything? by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #14 Thu Mar 31, 2005 at 12:26:00 AM EST
Now define proof. You see I would not be as extreme as your description of Nietzsche's view that there is no such thing as meaning, but would agree that any meaning of meaning is local and not universal, that being the one brought about the cooperative use of the term.

[ Parent ]

your words: `trivial to demonstrate' by lm (2.00 / 0) #15 Thu Mar 31, 2005 at 02:45:14 PM EST
1. To show clearly and deliberately; manifest: demonstrated her skill as a gymnast; demonstrate affection by hugging. 2. To show to be true by reasoning or adducing evidence; prove: demonstrate a proposition. 3. To present by experiments, examples, or practical application; explain and illustrate: demonstrated the laws of physics with laboratory equipment. 4. To show the use of (an article) to a prospective buyer: The salesperson plugged in and demonstrated the vacuum cleaner. Outside of of something akin to #4, you need to `prove' (whatever that may mean what you're going after. But in the case of #4, there is no real meaning.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

But we don't find proof impossible by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #16 Fri Apr 01, 2005 at 12:30:27 AM EST
We may disagree that there is any globally satisfactory concept of proof, but locally we still use the concept. To deny the existence of meaning or proof is like denying the existence of hammers. There may be some global disagreement about exactly what constitutes 'hammerness', but that doesn't mean hammers don't exist or stop us using them.

[ Parent ]

Which means that proof is impossible by lm (2.00 / 0) #17 Fri Apr 01, 2005 at 05:17:50 AM EST
A demonstration depends on global truths. It they do not exist, there is no proof, but only individual understanding which the individual has no way of knowing is true or not because of the inability to discover anything that extends beyond his or her own understanding.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

That's depends on a narrow understanding of proof by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #18 Fri Apr 01, 2005 at 05:33:47 AM EST
A demonstration can be local (to a context) and not depend on so called global truths. Some people don't even hold truth to be a literal correspondence between an assertion and 'things as they are'. We're not necessarily limited to an individuals understanding.

[ Parent ]

I don't dispute that by lm (2.00 / 0) #19 Sat Apr 02, 2005 at 08:02:01 PM EST
But what you're saying means nothing to me. It's utterly incoherent.
There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

You say a demonstration depends on global truths by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #20 Sun Apr 03, 2005 at 03:58:21 AM EST
I am using the terms global and local as specifiers of context rather than geography.

A demonstration depends only on a shared consensus of use of terms between the demonstrator and the audience. That audience is not necessarily global (in the context of being able to understand the terms used in the demonstration).

---

If I deny the existence of global (objective?) truths, then you might argue that the denial itself is an assertion of a global truth. Either my assertion is global, in which case its existence is counter to its own assertion. Or my assertion is only locally applicable, in which case there are global truths in some contexts but not others, which is contradictory. I of course can counter that your rebuttal makes circular use of the existence of global truths (itself being the assertion of a global truth) so is invalid as there are no global truths. Self-reference makes for as pretty a mess in epistemology as it does in logic and metamaths (cf Tarski).

[ Parent ]

Self-reference making a mess of things by lm (2.00 / 0) #22 Sun Apr 03, 2005 at 05:54:13 AM EST
Is why continental philosophy moved to the dialectic.

``I of course can counter that your rebuttal makes circular use of the existence of global truths (itself being the assertion of a global truth) so is invalid as there are no global truths.''

You're mistaken if you think circular logic is invalid. Circular logic is perfectly valid in that it is a tautology. The premise ``A == A'' can hardly be argued to be invalid. In fact, it is supremely valid in that if the premises are true, the conclusion necessarily follows. In a tautology, you can't have true premises and a false conclusion. Consequently, you can't move from a circular argument to the negation of its premises based only on logic.

However logical circular reasoning might be, though, it is not a sound argument unless you've accepted the premises. Since the premise is the conclusion, the only people who will be convinced are those who have already accepted the conclusion. So a circular argument is certainly not a cogent argument for someone that hasn't already accepted the conclusion.

Aside from which, I don't see how the rebuttal of the person who accepts global truths is any less tautological than the assertion that all truth is local. The demonstration of which requires that the conclusion be one of the premises.

There is no more degenerate kind of state than that in which the richest are supposed to be the best.
Cicero, The Republic
[ Parent ]

Touche by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #23 Mon Apr 04, 2005 at 02:39:32 AM EST
Circular logic is invalid in justification. The rebuttal is invalid, not the logic per se.

The maintainer of the local truth argument has to be using a different meaning of truth from the common sense understanding (which assumes all truth is objective and global), so is usually looked on as weird. I think we almost agree though that the argument is maybe futile.


[ Parent ]

btw, I did spot the humour in your reply by Dr H0ffm4n (2.00 / 0) #21 Sun Apr 03, 2005 at 04:05:16 AM EST
intentional or otherwise.

[ Parent ]

Constructing a Machiavellian Political Hypothesis | 23 comments (23 topical, 0 hidden) | Trackback

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