Is Government Good or Bad? “In Discussion: Lao-Tzu and Machiavelli’s view on Government” “The Master leads by emptying people’s mind and filling their cores, by weakening their ambition and toughening their resolve. He helps people lose everything they know, everything they desire, and creates confusion in those who think that they know. ” (Page 19). This passage supports a number of readings. All of them centered on government.
The definition of government is the organization, machinery, or agency through which a political unit exercises authority and performs functions and which is usually classified according to the distribution of power within it. Peter Bondanella insinuated, “The twentieth century has contributed a number of important interpretations of Machiavelli. He has been proclaimed as the founder of elitist theory, and his influence has been noted in the writings of Gaetano Mosca, Robert Michels, and Vilfredo Pareto.
He has been termed the founder of empirical political science, with a methodology comparable to that of Galileo Galilei in the physical sciences. Antonio Gramsci, Italy’s most original Marxist thinker in this era, defined Machiavelli’s “new” prince as the perfect example of the political myth and maintained that the modern political party must fulfill the role the prince fulfilled in Machiavelli’s works. ” Lao-Tzu’s Tao-te Ching -and Niccolo Machiavelli’s Qualities of the Prince talk about government and are very different thinkers in the form of what government should look like.
First, the Tao-te Ching text written by Lao-Tzu suggests that government should have Tao (God) in use to help. According to Wayne Alt, “It cannot be denied that religious sentiment is expressed in the Tao Te Ching and that some passages even reach for obscure transcendental themes. Yet these themes are but a fraction of the work’s overall philosophical richness. Most passages are concerned with ethical, political, and aesthetic matters. Some are antiConfucian. Others warn against too much ambition. A few counsel people to be simple rather than sophisticated, rural instead of urbane.
A preference is expressed for bumpkin wisdom rather than crafted intellection. People are encouraged to be without desire, to weaken their aversions, to control their aggressive instincts, and to let their lives follow a course that is more in harmony with nature than with the laws and ambitions of civil society. ” God can help in many ways, but can also stand in the way of things. There are different religions and beliefs and because of that many people don’t get along and because of this Lao-Tzu wrote a text about government.
Passage 18 states, “When the great Tao is forgotten, goodness and piety appear. When the body’s intelligence declines, cleverness and knowledge step forth. When there is no peace in the family, filial piety begins. When the country falls into chaos, patriotism is born. (Page 20-21, Passage 18). Secondly, Niccolo Machiavelli’s text The Qualities of the Prince decides whether it is better to be cruel or mercy. “Proceeding to the other qualities mentioned above, I say that every prince must desire to be considered merciful and not cruel; nevertheless, he must take care not to misuse this mercy.
Cesare Borgia was considered cruel; nonetheless, his cruelty had brought order to Romagna, united it, restored it to peace and obedience. ” (Page 41). Cesare Borgia lived from 1476-1507. He was known for his brutality and lack of scruples, not to mention his exceptionally good luck. He was firm ruler, son of Pope Alexander VI. To support this George Wilson wrote, “The Prince has been much maligned as a work that advocates cruelty. But steadfastly concerned for the common good, the author distinguishes between well- and illused cruelties.
He warns, for example, that in conquering and nnexing a hereditary state, a prince will not be secure until he kills the entire bloodline of the former ruling family. The general community, however, is to be left alone to practice its familiar customs without interference. There are two concerns—to extinguish the family of the hereditary prince, the people whom the new prince has dispossessed, and to leave the taxes and laws of the community undisturbed. In other words, the prince should not subject the entire community but rather a select few to cruelty.
These few unfortunates are victimized because doing so would secure the new prince’s position. This basically says that if you are a certain level of cruel than you can restore peace to your land, but you can’t forget about mercy. A prince needs to have mercy so that the peace will remain and that the leadership doesn’t turn into a dictatorship. The prince needs balance of cruelty and mercy. Finally, Lao-Tzu’s text Tao-te Ching and Niccolo Machiavelli’s The Qualities of the Prince differ in the fact that Lao-Tzu believes that the world can be transformed if people would center themselves in the circle and look at everybody else.
According to Yan Hektor, “From the perspective of human activities and the interactions between human beings, holding the belief that a person is not an automaton is compatible with a variety of attitudes that may have very different practical and ethical consequence. For example, viewing a human being as having a soul can lead to many different kinds of moral attitudes: one may think that the salvation of the soul of a human being depends on the grace of God or that a human being, having a soul, deserves unconditional respect.
Since such beliefs remain lifeless if disconnected from people’s actual ways of living, this suggests that it is attitude or action that gives meaning and significance to human practices and the ‘language game. ‘ In this sense, attitude and action are important conditions that belong to our complex practices. ” I believe that what Hektor wrote really supports passage thirty-seven from the Tao-te Ching text. This passage states, “The Tao never does anything, yet through it all things are done.
If powerful men and women could center themselves in it, the whole world would be transformed by itself, in its natural rhythms. People would be content with their simple, everyday lives, in harmony, and free of desire. When there is no desire, all things are at peace. ” (Page 23, Passage 37). This passage goes along with some other passage quite well. These basically say that powerful people in charge should look at other people before they look at themselves. This way there is no desire and when there is no desire everything is at peace.
When it is looked at how government should look Tao-te Ching written by Lao-Tzu and Machiavelli’s text The Qualities of the Prince disagree on many things. John B. Ellery suggests, “It is one g to defend the purpose of government. In so doing, it is no difficult task to cater to one’s fondest hopes and aspirations. It is quite another thing, however, to outline and to describe the many parts of the political mechanism which will insure the successful operation of a government designed to meet specifications drawn from a theoretical blueprint.
Page 48 concludes Machiavelli’s Prince really well, “I conclude, therefore, that a prince must be little concerned with conspiracies when the people are well disposed toward him; but when the populace is hostile and regards him with hatred, he must fear everything and everyone. And well-organized states and wise princes have, with great diligence, taken care not to anger the nobles and to satisfy the common people and keep them contended; for this is one of the most important concerns that a prince has. “
