អ្នកអានសៀវភៅ ក្បូនសឹក សម្តេច

"The Prince" is a 16th Century how-to book on running a country written by Niccolo Machiavelli. Published five years after his death in 1513,"The Prince" was written as a satire by Machiavelli while he was exiled from his home country of Italy after he was accused of being against the ruler of the then Florentine state, Lorenzo de Medici.

Machiavelli sarcastically dedicated the book to de Medici and wrote it as something of a how-to guide for being a prince (or monarch). The book's tone is harsh and cold. It describes the duties of a prince as being controlling and dictatorial.

However, the satire aspect was for many years lost in the translation. Many very famous world leaders have in the past (and still today) considered "The Prince" to be an actual guide. Dictators such as Hitler, Stalin and Lenin said during their lifetimes that they at least partially modeled their reigns of terror on the book.

ដូចបានឃើញក្នុង រូបខាងលើស្រាប់ថា អ្នកនយោបាយកម្ពុជា ជាពិសេស បក្សប្រឆាំង សុទ្ធតែបានអាន និង ប្រើប្រាស់ ទ្រឹស្តី ក្បូន សឹកសម្តេច ដើម្បីច្បាំងដណ្តើមអំណាចនិង ការពារអំណាច ដែលច្បាំងបាន ដូចជា ប៉ុល ពត សម រង្សី កឹម សុខា ខឹម វាសនា  (ករណី black hole ចំការម្រេចឆ្នាំ ២០២២) អៀងសារី ខៀវសំផន នួនជា ស៊ុន សេន ហ្គាំង ហ្គេចអ៊ាវ ហៅ ឌុច Duke អាណានិគមបារាំង និង អាមេរិក ដែលជិះជាន់កម្ពុជាកន្លងមក សុទ្ធតែ ធ្វើតាម ក្បូនសឹកនេះ...គឺ ក្នុងន័យ សម្លាប់កំទេច ដើម្បីកុំឲ្យមានការ ងើបបេះបោរ ដោយសារ ទំលាក់គ្រាប់បែក បបាត់អក្សរសាស្រ្ត ឬ គៀងគរ បណ្តេញប្រជាជនចេញពីក្រុង ឆ្នាំ ១៩៧៥ ដូចដែលប៉ុលពតធ្វើ Pol Pot and The Art of War គឺ ប៉ុល ពតនិង ក្បូន សឹក។

The princes of the 20th century

(This essay has been selected Best Research Paper by a Sophomore in 2005 Winter- ACL Best Paper Awards.)

(Essay)

Cudi Menase –ACL 2

"It's good to be true to your word, but you should lie whenever it advances your power or security—not only that, it's necessary…. seditious people should be amputated before they infect the whole state." (Machiavelli Chpt 15). Proposing radical and cruel solutions to the political crisises, Machiavelli has been one of the most discussed and criticized political philosophers throughout history. Ingersoll argues that for centuries Machiavelli’s name was a synonym for evil because of his exaggerated suggestions (588). Being well-known with his famous works The Prince and The Discourses, Machiavelli has always influenced the politicians since Renaissance. Even during the 20th century, the world has witnessed many politicians who followed his cruel principles in order to maintain their authority. Hitler and Stalin have been two of the most brutal leaders that kind. With their cruelty, illiberal actions and breaking promises, both of them have been the most powerful dictators of their times who were very much influenced by Machiavelli’s ideas.

The common political characteristics of Stalin and Hitler have been their cruel and illiberal actions and breaking promises where all of them are to be found in the brutal arguments of Machiavelli. In his work The Prince, Machiavelli has written all the political principals that a prince should fulfill and they were mostly cruel and illiberal. Throughout his work, he explains chapter by chapter how a real prince should rule his land and keep the control. As Langton says, Machiavelli shows the way to power, glory and popular support (1278). However, his proposals were not suiting to the general liberal politics where every cruel action was justified by its results. Machiavelli argues that if the act accuses him (the prince), the result should excuse him (Ingersoll 592). In order words, if the results of a cruel action are for the sake of the ruler then his blame becomes dissolved. Machiavelli explains his ideas about cruelty in the Chapter Fifteen of The Prince in a detailed way. He is proposing that anything that benefits the state is considered as good; even it is immoral or cruel.

Agreeing with Machiavelli’s arguments about cruelty, Hitler performed significant cruel actions that would favor his power and land. Without considering their cruelty and immorality, he took major brutal policies and activated masses. He created an unrealistic anti-Semitic ideology and motivated his people for his cruel intentions. The reason for his actions has been his Lebenstraum concerning the Eastern Europe where he needed a mass movement for achieving it (Hauner 16). According to Needler, during the multi-party system Hitler’s aim was to gather everyone under one ideology and reach the mass movement (666). However, there were different political groups with totally different political ideas. He had to attract every group within the country; namely nationalists, communists and religious groups (666). As a result, he established the most distinctive Weltanschauung for his party and developed an artificial ideology: anti-Semitism. He convinced people with the Jewish hatred, activated thousands of people to war and killed millions of Jews for the sake of his personal dreams. Although his cruel action caused death of million of people, he gained real admiration from his people and strengthen his power with this support. Accordingly, in the manner of Machiavelli, these acts were justified through its positive results.

On the other hand, Stalin acted in a similar cruel way with Hitler and killed everyone in his country who was a potential opposition to him. Stalin was the second ruler of communist Russia where he changed most of the policies of the first ruler; Lenin. As Himmer argues, his aim was “socialism in one country” and every policy should be taken accordingly (516). He had to reach his dream where every obstacle should be erased. As a result, Stalin started mass executions and mass arrests of certain politicians who were not supporting his ideas and creating opposition to his ideology. As CNN reports, he arrested 1,2 millions of politicians and killed half of them by torture (1). The reason was that they belonged to the Communist Party (fellows of Lenin) and therefore Stalin was seeing them as an opposition for his new Stalinist regime. Similar with Hitler, he killed everyone that might be an obstacle for his personal aims without considering the morality or cruelty of his actions. However, through these actions, he guaranteed his power and became the absolute dictator of the Soviet Russia.

Langton argues that Machiavelli’s dominant ideologies were nationalism and republicanism that he found as the main sources of a successful rule (1282). However, his ideologies didn’t contain the liberty of the citizens because people are always ready to rebel and to threaten the governor (1280). As Ingersoll claims “men are ambitious and given the opportunity will do evil” (591). Thinking in the similar way with Ingersoll, Machiavelli argues that men’s ambition for power have to be controlled by repression (Ingersoll 591). He sees this desire for power as a constant competition that would be a threat for the rule of the prince. As a result, liberal politics would be a major threat for a governor. However, knowing the importance of mass support, Machiavelli suggests in the Chapter Nine of The Prince that a successful prince has to win support of at least one group of citizens; either nobles or the peasants and repress the others. As a result, avoiding a total liberty the ruler will both gain a support from one part of the citizens and erase the threat of the other part.

Being highly aware of the need of mass support, Hitler always put massive importance on gaining the admiration of his people while repressing and destroying all the possible threats against his power. He activated his illiberal actions in a different manner. Hitler approached the issue not in a “class” perspective but in a “racial” one. As Needler argues; Hitler tried to gain support of all the communists, socialists, nationalists and catholic in Germany (666). He aimed to reach to every citizen who was Aryan and exclude all the outsiders. By proposing anti-Semitism as his political Weltanschuung, he created a unique ideology that gathered all these people under one rule (Needler 667). He was seeing all theNon-Aryans as a threat for his dream nation although they were German citizens and belonged to the German nation. As a result, he took the liberty of one specific group of citizen where he gave great liberty to the other group that would support him. As Machiavelli recommended, Hitler acted as nationalist and republicanist and created his own “Aryan-German” nation and destroyed the outsiders through illiberal actions.

On the other hand, creating the strict ideology of Stalinism, Stalin was highly illiberal where he targeted only the worker and peasant class that would achieve his socialist principles and excluded all the outsiders. Being a real socialist, he was highly against the bourgeoisie and privileged classes that he found as a major threat for his socialist dreams. Similar with Hitler he excluded millions of politicians and members of privileged groups in an illiberal way that were obstacles for his absolute rule. We can see his ambition for worker and peasant class in his own words:

The dictatorship of the proletariat was established in our country on the basis of an alliance between the workers and peasants. This is the first and fundamental basis of the Republic of Soviets. The workers and peasants could not have vanquished the capitalists and landlords without such an alliance. The workers could not have defeated the capitalists without the support of the peasants. The peasants could not have defeated the landlords without the leadership of the workers. (Stalin 2)

As visible in this quote, Stalin gave great importance on peasant and worker class where they were the core stones of his power. However, as discussed above, he didn’t give the same importance to the other groups where he performed illiberal actions. Similar with Hitler, he approached the nationalism and republicanism issue from his own point of view and excluded all the outsiders in order to gain the support of a specific group.

Ingersoll argues that according to Machiavelli the greatest fear of a prince may be a possible instability of his rule where it can be removed by proper cruel actions to his citizens (593). Machiavelli thinks that “all men are bad and ever ready to display their vicious nature whenever they find occasion for it” (Ingersoll 591). Accordingly, he suggests in the Chapter Eight of The Prince that a wise prince must be willing to practice proper cruelty to his own citizens in order to maintain power. What ever his promises to his people, he has to think in a pragmatic way and secures his power in breaking the promises. Ingersoll says that a prince should reach to maximum personal power through whatever it requires; even breaking promises and performing cruelty (592).

Hauner argues that Hitler had a specific “Programme” to make Germany a future world power and bring his nation to the highest standard of the world where he broke this promise and excluded millions of Germans from this plan (15). When Hitler came to the rule in the early 30s, his long term objectives seemed to include every German citizen. He was the absolute ruler of Germany and was trying to prove the power of his nation. However, Hauner argues that although Hitler seemed fighting for the whole German nation, this was not the case where it was all visible in Hitler’s secret writings in the early 30s (17). Hitler’s aim was creating a pure Aryan nation that would exclude every other race. With the starting of the WWII, Hitler broke his promises for the whole German nation and performs cruel acts to the Non-Aryan Germans because he saw them as obstacles for the stability of his rule. As a result, Hitler killed millions of German Jews in a very organized way in order to fulfill his anti-Semitic ideology and reach to its racial Herrenvolk (Hauner 16). As Needler explains, Hitler used anti-Semitism in order to create a superficial consistency and stability among the various ideological groups (667). Needler adds that Hitler showed Jews as the causes of unfair competition, labor troubles and high wages (668). As a result, in order to prove his arguments he broke his promises that included the entire German nation and he killed millions of German Jews. As Machiavelli suggested, he performed “proper cruelty” to his people by breaking promises and maintained the stability of his rule.

On the other hand, Stalin behaved in a similar way with Hitler and excluded some groups of citizens from his plans for the Soviet Union and caused millions of his people die. When Stalin came to the rule in the early 20s, he was acting as the ultimate saver of the whole Soviet nation. He was defending the rights of the entire citizen groups and was trying to create “socialism in on country”. However, things didn’t go well for whole nation. Stalin broke his promises and excluded some groups from his plans. He arrested 1,2 millions of politicians and killed half of them. The reason was to erase any political opposition and maintain his power. In addition to that he also tortured his peasants in order to fulfill al the policies required for “socialism in one country”. As CNN reports:

To ensure his position and to push forward "socialism in one country," he put the Soviet Union on a course of crash collectivization and industrialization. An estimated 25 million farmers were forced onto state farms. Collectivization alone killed as many as 14.5 million people, and Soviet agricultural output was reduced by 25 percent, according to some estimates. (1)

As Machiavelli suggested, Stalin performed “proper” cruelty to his own citizens that would threaten his rule. In order to maintain the stability of his power he broke his promises and didn’t include the entire Soviet nation into his plans for the future.

As a conclusion, Hitler and Stalin have been two of the most ruthless leaders of the Twentieth century with their all cruel and illiberal actions. They killed millions of people for the sake of their personal ideologies. Agreeing with most of the arguments of Machiavelli, they tried to destroy everything that might create a threat to their power and damage the stability of their rules. They created their own ideologies and became two of the most fearful leaders of all times. Although they were seen as the cruelest dictators of the last century, their policies were highly accepted by Machiavelli’s arguments in his work The Prince. All their actions find their place in Machiavelli’s claims that have been regarded as evil suggestions for centuries long (Ingersoll 588). Consequently, Hitler and Stalin fulfilled these propositions so accurately and successfully that Machiavelli would be proud of these princes if he would have lived in the Twentieth century.

Works cited

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Hauner, Milan. “Did Hitler Want a World Dominion?” Journal of Contemporary

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Himmer, Robert. “The Transition from War Communism to the New Economic

Policy.” The Russian Review. 53 (1994): 515-529.

Ingersoll, David. “The Constant Prince: Private Interests and Public Goals in

Machiavelli.” The Western Political Quarterly. 21.4 (1968): 588-596.

Langton, J. & Deitz, M. G. “Machiavelli's Paradox: Trapping or Teaching the Prince.”

The American Political Science Review. 81.4 (1987): 1277-1288.

Machiavelli, Niccolo. The Prince. W. K. Marriott (Trans.), 1505. Online. Internet.

02 March 2005. Available at http://www.constitution.org/mac/prince00.htm

Needler, Martin. “Hitler's Anti-Semitism: A Political Appraisal.”

The Public Opinion Quarterly. 24.4 (1960): 665-669.

Stalin, J.V. “On the Death of Lenin: As Speech Delivered at the Second All-Union

Congress of Soviets”. Selected Works. Albania: The “8 Nëntori” Publishing House, 1979 (First published in 1924). Access date. 17 March 2005. http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/