Many people theorized about how true leadership should be and how they should act. Plato and Machiavelli are those who questioned the qualities of a leader and their definition of leadership still have validity in discussing the modern time republics. Plato's ‘Republic’ was written in ancient Greek in order to create an ideal state including the so called 'perfect' leader and Machiavelli's ‘The Prince’ was written in the 16th century giving advices to princes to regulate their states. Although these two philosophers lived in completely different conditions, both of them have strong points in defining a leader. Machiavelli has strongly persuasive arguments on leadership since he apprehends in his famous book ‘The Prince’ in chapter 17 the human nature very accurately.
57). If leaders of government imposed regulations on the people, he believed this would hamper society’s growth and the people would not maintain the highest level of happiness. This demonstrates a good leader should empower the people to become more independent and to instill trust in the people to make the right choice. Machiavelli, a totalitarian thinker, believed that a leader should maintain a dictatorship rule with complete power by any means necessary without regard to the people’s expectations. He states, “Hence it is necessary for a prince who wishes to maintain his position to learn how not to be good, and to use this knowledge or not to use it according to necessity” (38, ver.
The king at the time of Mussolini’s coming to power was King Victor Emmanuel III. He was an unremarkable ruler who achieved very little. He was the one who gave into the terms and conditions of the people of Italy, due to factors, which got to him, such as fear of a civil war, socialism and his sense of insecurity. Only the king had the power to appoint the Prime Minister, so it was in Mussolini’s favor to force it upon him. By the autumn of 1922, Mussolini was in contact with most major politicians of the formation of a new government that would include the fascists.
Thucydides’ work, however, was not simply a book written about Athens as the protagonist which was defeated by its foolish over-ambition, he wrote about the Athenians and Spartans with similar objectivity, acknowledging both their weaknesses and virtues. Thucydides regularly demonstrated a “determination to establish what happened and why”. He believed one of the primary reasons for the decline of Athens was because of the political problems with democracy and selfish imperialism. Whilst he used facts to support this belief, he expressed it most directly when quoting speeches. I will examine the purpose of Thucydides’ work by assessing his omissions, the events he chooses to focus on more closely, and his own analysis of his work.
Although he wanted a democratic unified government, many of his ideas were very radical and idealistic. Mazzini’s ideas were clearly portrayed in the motto of the Roman Republic,”Dio et il popolo” (God and the People) and that Italy should be unified ‘from below’. He wanted the people of Italy to rise up from their high-powered oppressors and stressed that they should be unified by their ‘own efforts’ for fear that one domination would be replaced by another outside influence, Mazzini’s key idea of Nationalism would mean a ‘violent insurrection’ was needed. Some Liberals opposed this idea of violence and instead wanted to work with rulers to gain Constitutions instead. Therefore he had limited appeal and lacked progress and so is a reason for the slow progress of the unification of Italy.
Hellenic Athens and Sparta The barbaric stereotypes people think of when referring to the Spartan society makes the Athenian civilization seem to correspond to our modern society. However, the savage imagery we conceive of the Spartans prevents the exploration of their civility. Even though they did have an extremely militaristic state of mind, they also had an incredibly well organized government system. Politically, socially, and culturally, the two Hellenic city-states of Greece had many differences, but simultaneously were very similar. In the eighth century B.C.E., Hellenic Athens was an oligarchic government.
Thucydides’ concern was with state power, but the same dynamic may relate to individual politicians seeking power, effect, and then stability. Thucydides addresses the issue of powerful leaders particularly in his narrative of the Sicilian expedition. Nicias attempts, without success, to relinquish his command of the Athenian forces: he wishes not to represent the imperial city in its moment of defeat. Alcibiades is the figure of the crafty leader. He is such an independent individual that he can go over to Sparta and then come back to Athens.
Thucydides vs. Plato The meaning of a good life can be drastically different depending on your point of view and the way you look at the world in front of you. Greek philosophers Thucydides and Plato were no different in this matter as they saw the world in two completely different ways. Thucydides used empirical claims to describe what he believed a good life was based on what he observed amongst the men fighting in the Peloponnesian War. On the other hand, Plato used normative claims to describe his beliefs based on what he believed, not observed, a good life entails. First off, it is important to note what the differences between these two types of thinking are.
Their overarching beliefs dealing with human nature and structure of government are relatively similar, with slight variations, while the most distinct differences within their ideologies appear when analyzing the purpose of government. Machiavelli and Hobbes’ portrayals of human nature are both quite pessimistic, their main observation being that men are self-interested. This is understandable considering they both wrote at times of turmoil: The Prince was written for the Medici family during the upheaval of the Italian Wars and Hobbs wrote Leviathan in the wake of the Civil War in England. Machiavelli argued that humans were good only when it served their self-interest, claiming that men are “are ungrateful, fickle, pretenders, and dissemblers, evaders of danger, eager for gain (Machiavelli p. 66)” Machiavelli explains that “it is a very natural and ordinary thing to desire to acquire (Machiavelli p.14)” thus, maximizing power is part of human nature and self-gain often outweighs morality. Hobbes shares this stance but portrays human nature as more inherently brutal.
Machiavelli's view on Government Machiavelli was a great thinker of his time and almost all of his views can be related to current situations. In his essay, The Moral of the Prince, he writes about the real truth of principles a prince ought to adopt opposed to those that are imagined by the people that a prince or head of state ought to possess. The government is a twisted system and in order to do the right thing, we should try not to do the right thing but to persuade people that it was the right thing to do. There is no perfect leader, what we portray as a perfect leader is nothing but our minds going wild wanting to do good all the time. Immigration is a huge issue in America.