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The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli is Machiavelli's description of the perfect prince, or leader. His description uses a lot of compare and contrasts and examples of actual rulers and their triumphs or follies. I agree with his idea of the perfect leader, but I dont think dictatorship is the perfect government. Machiavelli describes his perfect prince as someone who can balance two of seemingly contrasting characteristics.
He states that the prince must be liberal. Even though his subjects will grow to hate him, the prince will have enough income to have a powerful army and will be able to defend his country in war. Machiavelli goes on by stating that this perfect leader would be better off feared by others rather than loved. Basically, because friends will be there when he doesnt need them, and gone when he does.
But if he were feared, then his followers would be loyal and scared to do otherwise. Yet, the perfect prince is also described as a good person, or he should appear that way. Machiavelli described this as appearing of good nature, yet not hesitant to punish those who need to be. Machiavelli uses examples in this writing of actual rulers and their accounts to help prove his point on the perfect prince. He used such rulers as Caesar, Louis XII, Ferdinand II, and so on.
He described either the good or bad things they did as rulers. He then used these examples to prove such points as how the prince should spend the money of others to increase his reputation. This helped me understand where Machiavelli was coming from to make his claims of the perfect leader. I was able to see why being feared was an asset to a ruler, and how being nice could lead to their downfall. Now when I was reading this story I began to put all of these characteristics in a normal person. This is why I began to do disagree with Machiavelli's thoughts.
As I read on, I began to see, through his examples of other rulers, where he was coming from. As a single ruler of a country, I would agree with what Machiavelli wrote to describe the perfect one. To have all of the problems of one country on your hands, and all of its citizens leaving it up to you, you would have to be feared and loved at the same time. This I do agree with, but to be this way as a person is cold. People should be able to trust others and be nice to others. I disagree with the whole concept though of having one ruler.
As you can see, it just makes the one person selfish and feared. A country full of citizens should have rights. And should be run by groups, and the people in those groups should be chosen by the citizens. In conclusion, I believe if there is going to be one ruler of a country, he or she should be feared and loved. But my biggest point is if I wrote a book on the perfect leader, it would be called The Democracy. Because then there wouldnt have to be one confused person trying to be two things at once, and unable to trust anybody.
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