Ephraim-Stephen Essien, PhD
The African Prince is the African replica of the character of the political leader based on Niccolo Machiavelli’s book, The Prince, written in 1513, in Florence, Italy, and dedicated to Lorenzo de Medici, the ruler of Florence.
Niccolo di Bernardo Machiavelli (1469-1527 AD) was an Italian historian, philosopher, politician, diplomat, humanist and writer.
Maurizio Viroli (2000) says that Machiavelli was born in a tumultuous era in which popes waged acquisitive wars against Italian city-states, and people and cities often fell from power as France, Spain, and the Holy Roman Empire battled for regional influence and control. Then, political-military alliances continually changed, featuring mercenary leaders, who changed sides without warning, and the rise and fall of many short-lived governments (Viroli, 2000: chapter 1).
Niccolo Machavelli’s political philosophy is often regarded as the first theoretical basis of political realism and modern dictatorship (Essien, 2015: chapter 8). This may be due, partly, to the fact that, in place of democratic and ethical ideals, Machiavelli preferred the opposite in The Prince.
Might is right and right is might in the Machiavellian political architecture. Morality does not exist in Machiavelli’s political thought, provided the ruler, the leader or the prince retains his throne and achieves his purpose.
Immorality, argued Machiavelli, has an advantage when the ruler skillfully uses it to gain his ends (for the end justifies the means). The prince must be morally indifferent. Machiavelli suggests (in The Prince, 120-121) that the prince must be concerned not only with reputation, but also must be positively willing to act immorally at the right times.
Machiavelli believed that, as a ruler, it was better to be widely feared than to be greatly loved; A loved ruler retains authority by obligation while a feared leader rules by fear of punishment.
He said that it would be best to be both loved and feared. But since the two rarely come together, anyone compelled to choose will find greater security in being feared than in being loved (The Prince, 60).
Since human nature is essentially selfish, Machiavelli argues, the effective motives on which the prince must rely must of necessity be egoistic. He must be the omnipotent legislator. A successful state must be founded by a single man, and the laws and government which he creates should determine the national character of his people.
He must be the sole national leader and controller of the people. The Machiavellian leader must be crafty, cunning, clever, shrewd, foxy, vulpine and absolutely serpentine (Essien, 2015: chapter 8). He must pretend to be good to the people, but bad, wicked and selfish within. He is the law, the legislator and the judge. All powers belong to him and all must be subject to him.
The prince must be a warrior. Therefore he must have knowledge of war and its strategy.
On the need for the ruler to have knowledge of war, Machiavelli says:
A prince… must have no other object or thought, nor acquire skill in anything, except war, its organization, and its discipline. The art of war is all that is expected of a ruler…The first way to lose your state is to neglect the art of war; the first way to win a state is to be skilled in the art of war (The Prince, 47).
Machiavelli maintains that the prince must never let his thoughts stray from military exercises, which he must pursue more vigorously in peacetime than in war. He suggests that besides keeping his men well organized and trained, he must always go a-hunting, so accustoming his body to hardships and also learning some practical geography; how the mountains slope, how the valleys open, how the plains spread out.
He must study rivers and marshes. According to Machiavelli, if the prince obtains a clear understanding of local geography he would have a better understanding of how to organize his defence; and in addition his knowledge of and acquaintance with local conditions will make it easy for him to grasp the features of any new locality with which he may need to familiarize himself (The Prince 46-47).
Machiavelli prefigured the tyrants in Europe, Asia and Africa. His political philosophy has an evil repute and is despicable in the light of civilized government. Machiavelli’s government is the government of the brute despot.
Machiavellian doctrines are strange, bizarre, gruesome, grotesque, barbaric, callous, obnoxious, volatile, inflammable, awkward, obscure, nefarious, egotistical, narcissistic, dangerous, but pragmatic and real (Essien, 2015: chapter 8).
Leo Strauss says that Machiavelli is the only political thinker whose name has come into common use for designating a kind of politics, which exists and will continue to exist independently of his influence, a politics guided exclusively by considerations of expediency, which uses all means, fair or foul, iron or poison, for achieving its ends—its end being the aggrandizement of one’s country or fatherland—but also using the fatherland in the service of the self-aggrandizement of the politician or statesman or one’s party (Strauss, 1958: 297)
For describing what the rulers actually do, Machiavelli instituted a political realism; and for building generalizations from experience and historical facts, Machiavelli instituted a political empiricism; a political inductivism; and an inductionist politics (Essien, 2015: chapter 8).
Thomas Hobbes’ “Leviathan”; Friedrich Nietzsche’s “Superman” (Ubermensch); and Niccolo Machiavelli’s “Prince” were to operate on the same political doctrinal trajectory of “The end justifies the means” and “Might is right”, which were also the strategic credo of Alexander the Great (Essien, 2015: chapter 8). Other watchwords for the Machiavellian from Machiavelli were
It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.
Whosoever desires constant success must change his conduct with the times.
Men judge generally more by the eye than by the hand, for everyone can see and few can feel. Everyone sees what you appear to be, few really know what you are.
“If an injury has to be done to a man it should be so severe that his vengeance need not be feared.
The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.
Never was anything great achieved without danger.
Where the willingness is great, the difficulties cannot be great.
Politics have no relation to morals.
One who deceives will always find those who allow themselves to be deceived.
There is no avoiding war; it can only be postponed to the advantage of others.
Here we find ourselves!
Machiavellian political philosophy has had untold influence on most African political leaders both ancient and modern. Today, any political action that stands opposite to ethical moral virtues is often seen as dirty politics or described as “Machiavellian”. This is African Politics Today!
Essien is a political philosopher and Associate Professor in University of Abuja.
