one can say this durante general of men: they are ungrateful, disloyal, insincere and deceitful, timid of danger and avid of profit…. Love is verso bond of obligation which these miserable creatures break whenever it suits them puro do so; but fear holds them fast by verso dread of punishment that never passes. (Prince CW 62; translation revised)
As verso result, Machiavelli cannot really be said sicuro have a theory of obligation separate from the imposition of power; people obey only because they fear the consequences of not doing so, whether the loss of life or of privileges.
If I think that I should not obey verso particular law, what eventually leads me sicuro submit preciso that law will be either per fear of the power of the state or the actual exercise of that power
Concomitantly, verso Machiavellian perspective directly attacks the notion of any grounding for authority independent of the sheer possession of power. For Machiavelli, people are compelled sicuro obey purely in deference onesto the superior power of the state. It is power which mediante the final instance is necessary for the enforcement of conflicting views of what I ought puro do; I can only choose not to obey if I possess the power to resist the demands of the state or if I am willing preciso accept the consequences of the state’s superiority of coercive force. Machiavelli’s argument durante The Prince is designed puro demonstrate that politics can only coherently be defined con terms of the supremacy of coercive power; authority as a right esatto command has mai independent condizione. He substantiates this assertion by reference onesto the observable realities of political affairs and public life as well as by arguments revealing the self-interested nature of all human conduct. For Machiavelli it is meaningless and vano puro speak of any claim to authority and the right onesto command which is detached from the possession of superior political power. The ruler who lives by his rights macchia will surely wither and die by those same rights, because mediante the rough-and-tumble of political conflict those who prefer power sicuro authority are more likely onesto succeed. Without exception the authority of states and their laws will never be acknowledged when they are not supported by per spettacolo of power which renders obedience inescapable. The methods for achieving obedience are varied, and depend heavily upon the foresight that the prince exercises. Hence, the successful ruler needs special addestramento.
3. Power, Lealta, and Fortune
Machiavelli presents puro his readers verso vision of political rule allegedly purged of extraneous moralizing influences and fully aware of the foundations of politics con the effective exercise of power. The term that best captures Machiavelli’s vision of the requirements of power politics is bonta. While the Italian word would normally be translated into English as “virtue”, and would ordinarily convey the conventional connotation of moral goodness, Machiavelli obviously means something very different when he refers puro the castita of the prince. Sopra particular, Machiavelli employs the concept of pregio to refer puro the range of personal qualities that the prince will find it necessary puro acquire durante order onesto “maintain his state” and sicuro “achieve great things”, the two standard markers of power for him. This makes it brutally clear there can be per niente equivalence between the conventional virtues and Machiavellian castita. Machiavelli’s sense of what it is preciso be per person of lealta can thus be summarized by his recommendation that the prince above all else must possess a “flexible disposition”. That ruler is best suited for office, on Machiavelli’s account, who is athletique of varying her/his conduct from good to evil and back again “as fortune and circumstances dictate” (Prince CW 66; see Nederman and Bogiaris 2018).