OTPO 1125 - MACHIAVELLI’S POLITICAL THOUGHT AND ITS MODERN READERS
OTPO 1125 · Spring semester 2025-2026
- Language of tuition
- English
- Course type
- Cours séminaire
- Number of hours
- 24
- Credits
- 6
Information
Description
Few authors have been as controversial as Niccolò Machiavelli. The influence of this Italian political thinker on the theoretical imagination of subsequent thinkers and writers has been immense. Yet strong disagreements persist regarding how to interpret Machiavelli’s ideas, and questions continue to arise concerning the political meaning of his thought. Is there a core message to Machiavellian politics? Should we regard him as a political philosopher, a theorist, or a “scientist” of politics? Can he be classified as a realist, or should we instead consider him a republican or a plebeian actor and thinker, as recent scholarship suggests? What impact have his ideas had on twentieth-century political thought?
This course has a twofold objective. Each class will examine and discuss key passages from Machiavelli’s works, alongside important modern and contemporary texts inspired by Machiavelli’s ideas. On the one hand, the course aims to engage directly with selected passages from Machiavelli’s two major works: (1) Il Principe (The Prince) and (2) Discorsi sopra la prima Deca di Tito Livio (Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livy). This analysis will emphasize the complexity of Machiavelli’s thought within its historical context, challenging any reduction to simplistic labels. His texts will be explored through close, critical reading and compared with the ideas of his primary sources—particularly Polybius, Dante, Petrarch, Plutarch, Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and Moses Maimonides.
On the other hand, the course will examine the reception and influence of Machiavelli’s thought among key twentieth-century thinkers. Students will engage with works by Antonio Gramsci, Claude Lefort, Isaiah Berlin, Leo Strauss, and Louis Althusser, as well as with the most recent scholarly literature in Machiavelli studies. This approach will enable students to gain not only a deeper understanding of Machiavelli’s texts but also insight into how diverse political thinkers have drawn on his work to develop their own theoretical frameworks.
Teaching format
Séminaire
Assessment
Présentations orales, essais en classe
Readings
Main readings 5
-
Aristotle. The Politics and the Constitution of Athens. Translated by Steven Everson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
-
Machiavelli, Niccolò. Discourses on Livy. Translated by Nathan Tarcov and Harvey Mansfield, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995.
-
Machiavelli, Niccolò. The Prince. Translated by Harvey Mansfield, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998.
-
St. Thomas Aquinas. On Kingship in Political Writings. Translated by R.W. Dyson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
-
The Letters of Machiavelli. Edited and translated by Alan Gilbert, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961.
Further readings 19
-
Albertini, Rudolf von. Das florentinische Staatsbewußtsein im Übergang von der Republik zum Prinzipat. Bern: Francke Verlag, 1955.
-
Althusser, Louis. Machiavelli and Us. Translated by Gregory Elliott. London: Verso, 1999.
-
Anglo, Sydney. Machiavelli--the First Century: Studies in Enthusiasm, Hostility, and Irrelevance. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
-
Arendt, Hannah. “What is Authority?”. In, ibid., Between Past and Future, London: Penguin 2006, pp. 91-141
-
Baron, Hans. “Machiavelli: the Republican Citizen and the Author of ‘The Prince'”, The English Historical Review 76 no. 299 (1961), pp. 217-253.
-
Baron, Hans. The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1966.
-
Benner, Erica. Machiavelli’s Ethics. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2009.
-
Berlin, Isaiah. “The Originality of Machiavelli” in Berlin, Isaiah, Reading Political Philosophy: Machiavelli to Mill. London: Routledge, 2000.
-
Bock, Gisela, Quentin Skinner, and Viroli, Viroli (eds.) Machiavelli and Republicanism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
-
Cicero, Marcus Tullius. On the Commonwealth and on the Laws. Translated by James E. G. Zetzel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.
-
Guicciardini, Francesco. “Considerations of the Discourses of Niccolò Machiavelli.” In The Sweetness of Power: Machiavelli’s Discourses and Guicciardini’s Considerations, edited by James B. Atkinson, and David Sices, DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Library, 2007.
-
Guicciardini, Francesco. The History of Florence. Translated by Mario Dommandi. New York: Harper & Row, 1970.
-
Livy, Titus. Rome and Italy. Translated by Betty Radice. London: Penguin, 1982. Books VI-X.
-
Livy, Titus. Rome and the Mediterranean. Translated by Henry Bettenson. London: Penguin, 1976. Books XXXI-XLV.
-
Livy, Titus. The Early History of Rome. Translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt. London: Penguin, 2002. Books I-V.
-
Livy, Titus. The War With Hannibal. Translated by Aubrey de Sélincourt. London: Penguin, 1972. Books XXI-XXX.
-
Polybius. The Histories. Translated by Robin Waterfield. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010.
-
Savonarola, Girolamo. “Treatise on the Rule and Government of the City of Florence.” In Selected Writings of Girolamo Savonarola: Religion and Politics, 1490-1498. Edited by Anne Pastore Passaro Borelli, Maria C., New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.
-
Tacitus, Cornelius. The Annals. Translated by J. C. Yardley. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
Teaching units
| Unit no. | Unit type | Teaching units | Teachers | Number of hours | Credits |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 58661 | Cours séminaire | Civic Humanism. Machiavelli and his contemporary readers | Alessandro MULIERI | 24 | 6 |
Teachers
- Alessandro MULIERI
In the curricula
- Master Political Science - General Track in English semester 2 (2025-2026)ÉCOLE DE LA RECHERCHE
- Master Science politique - Théorie politique semestre 2 (2025-2026)ÉCOLE DE LA RECHERCHE
Contacts and resources
- Contact
- CISSE Fathim