The Prince: A Book That Influenced the Course of World History

Author: Niccolò Machiavelli
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2001-04-01
Features: This book includes: the types of principalities and how to acquire them, discussions on hereditary principalities, mixed principalities, why the Persian Empire conquered by Alexander the Great did not betray his successors after his death, and how to govern cities or principalities that lived under their own laws before being occupied. In Machiavelli's works, The Prince is the smallest but the most famous. It was published five years after the author's death in 1532 and has, over the past 450 years, sparked various strong reactions across religious, political, academic, and social spheres from the West to the East. In the 1980s, it was listed as one of the most influential and bestselling top ten world classics.
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) was a renowned political thinker, historian, and writer during the Italian Renaissance. In his masterpiece The Prince, Machiavelli's shocking viewpoint is that a ruler must combine the ferocity of a lion with the cunning of a fox, and may resort to any means to achieve political goals. His ideas have sparked fierce debate since their inception while also having a profound impact. Those who detest him call him the "mentor of tyrants," while those who admire him honor him as the "theoretical pioneer of nationalist states" and the "founder of modern political science." The book consists of 26 chapters. The first 11 chapters discuss how principalities should be ruled and maintained, emphasizing that it is easy to protect a state with power but difficult without it, and that rulers should rely on cruelty and deception to prevail. Chapters 12–14 clarify that an army is the foundation of all states, and that rulers should have their own armies, with war, military systems, and training being their sole specialty. The last 12 chapters are the core of the book, comprehensively arguing Machiavelli's theory of pragmatic governance.