The problem of Free Will in Machiavelli’s The Prince
Italian philosopher and statesman, Machiavelli.
Alexander Nemec / December 9 2020
(8 min read)
Free will, as a concept, haunts philosophers, and surely some other people who actually care about these kinds of things for a good amount of time now (let’s say ever since we became conscious of our own existence?). Niccolo Machiavelli, sixteenth-century political scientist and to some extent a Philosopher, in his most famous piece of writing, The Prince, which can be summarized as a practical guide for at the time current and future rulers (possibly even for ours) based on Machiavelli’s empirical observations of his time in Italy, and his extensive studies of history. In this highly practical book, Machiavelli, of course, attempts to present his understanding of a highly unpractical concept of free will and whether we, human beings, have it. However, if one follows his logic concerning this concept in relation to other crucial concepts in his work such as fortune, human nature, and virtue, things start to appear problematic. And I will be showing how much problematic. Specifically, I will be showing how Machiavelli’s conception of fortune and human nature in The Prince logically completely destroys his own ideas of free will and virtue.
To understand the relationship of the mentioned concepts and their relevance to the discourse on free will and virtues, it is important to first, take each part for itself. However, I will have to consider virtue and fortune together, while the way Machiavelli (1998) uses them makes them almost inseparable. This can be seen for example when he writes about the great virtuous men of history such as Romulus or Moses: “Without that opportunity, their virtue of spirit would have been eliminated, and without that virtue, the opportunity would have come in vain” (p. 23). But anyway, for a start it is at least important to understand what does Machiavelli mean when he uses the words fortune, virtue, and human nature.
Machiavelli’s use of virtue can be understood as a talent, drive, or action towards a certain goal. What is interesting is that Machiavelli, in contrast with writers before him, such as the ancient Greeks or thinkers of the Catholic church, is not giving this word any moral value. This is an important factor all over the book, while he advises the ruler on numerous occasions to use his virtue to harm or to steal or to break promises to achieve his ends. Machiavelli presents virtue as the most important quality for a prince, whether he is to be a loved monarch or a hated cruel tyrant. Without it, he would never be able to achieve his ends, or if he somehow did, it would only be with the help of fortune.
Moving now to fortune, it (or she) can be understood simply as a chance. Machiavelli uses it basically as an explanation for everything in the world which human beings cannot control. In the context of princes and rulers, this can mean anything from the place of their birth to their sword breaking in the battle causing them to lose their life or their kingdom. Machiavelli highly discourages princes to rely simply on fortune, while it is a fickle force which can destroy great kingdoms in a matter of a few moments if one is not prepared to meet her head-on (with the use of virtue).
Finally, as for Machiavelli’s (1998) view on human nature, it is unsurprisingly very realistic, one can almost call it cynical. He claims that human beings are generally selfish, self-serving creatures, who you can win over one day and lose them the day after. They admire honourable, faithful, generous, and all people of this sort, but most of the time lack those virtues themselves. Human nature in Machiavelli is a crucial part of his whole theory, while he suggests that human beings can only act according to their nature, which itself is unchangeable. “Nor may a man be found so prudent as to know how to accommodate himself to this, whether because he cannot deviate from what nature inclines him to…” (p.100). In practice, this means that if a person has in nature to act aggressively, he will always act aggressively.
So now, after having explained the main concepts which Machiavelli (1998) uses in regards to human beings all over the book, we can finally turn to the question of free will. Regarding this topic, Machiavelli writes that “Nonetheless, that our free will not be eliminated, I judge that it might be true that fortune is the arbiter of half our actions, but also that she leaves the other half or close to it, for us to govern” (p.98). This statement of his implies that Machiavelli believed or was at least ready to accept the idea that human beings have something which can be called free will. It also makes a logical sense, while if he would claim that there is no such thing, his work would be useless, while everything would be governed by something beyond human beings and therefore the book would not have any actual impact by itself because nobody would be able to decide to act accordingly to its teaching. However, at the same Machiavelli gives free will very limited scope of influence. As can be seen in the quote above, he limits it to only half or possibly even less of human actions while the other half stays in the realm of fortune.
Nevertheless, I believe a big problem arises for this whole idea of free will, once we take a more detailed look at what Machiavelli wrote about human nature, specifically the earlier mentioned section on how human nature is unchangeable. In the 25th chapter of The Prince, he is writing about his observation of how human nature helps or ruins rulers, depending on the circumstances of its times. This whole idea can be summed up by imagining a king, who is impetuous by nature. If circumstances are right, this nature of his can be admired by people, because in that time being impetuous is welcomed, and therefore this king, thanks to his nature, is successful. However, this same king, if we put him into a context where being impetuous is not welcomed, will be ruined by his nature, the same nature which in different times and circumstances would have made him the most admired king. Bearing in mind that human nature is according to Machiavelli unchangeable, this implies that the whole success or failure of a ruler rests solely on the fact whether his nature is loved or hated in circumstances of his time. I would argue that this part of the 25th chapter deeply undermines everything that Machiavelli said up to this point, especially the whole idea of people having free will, and consequently human virtues. If human nature is unchangeable, what place does free will have in the world? Free will implies the ability to be able to make decisions for yourself (whatever that yourself is). But if you cannot change your nature, which from what Machiavelli wrote follows, it seems that you cannot really claim and prove that you make decisions for yourself and are not just a product of your nature which was given to you by fortune.
And what does this mean for Machiavelli’s virtues? Virtues in The Prince, as mentioned above, are understood generally as actions towards a certain goal. Therefore, what makes a person virtuous, is taking the right actions towards a certain goal, for example, the goal of becoming a king. However, the word action implies that there is an actor who is the source of this action. If there is no free will, as it seems in Machiavelli, and everything is a product of our unchangeable nature, that means that we as human beings are not the ones responsible for what becomes of us, but its the achievement or failure of whoever or whatever gave us our nature. Therefore if this is true, nobody could be actually virtuous apart from that unspecified being or phenomena (like fortune) which is the reason for our virtues.
Free will, as presented in Machiavelli proves to be a very problematic concept, I would even dare to say theory destroying. As I have shown by summarizing Machiavelli’s thoughts on fortune, virtue, human nature, and free will, if we follow his logic and argumentation and its implications deep and far enough, we arrive at a conclusion which becomes problematic for each of these four concepts. If there is no free will, there are no virtuous people, and if there are no virtuous people, there are no princes about which Machiavelli writes. All that is left is an unchangeable human nature, given to us by someone or something which we might as well call fortune. So in short, this shows how Machiavelli’s own concepts of fortune and human nature managed, at least on a logical level, to destroy his concepts of free will and virtues.
References
Machiavelli, N., Machiavelli, N., & Mansfield, H. C. (1998). The prince.
