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The Discourses on Livy (Discorsi sopra la prima deca di Tito Livio, Discourses on the First Ten Books of Titus Livy) is a work of political history and philosophy composed in the early 16th century by the famed Florentine public servant and political theorist Niccolò Machiavelli (1469-1527), best known as the author of The Prince. Where The Prince is devoted to advising the ruler of a principality, i.e., a type of monarchy, the Discourses purport to explain the structure and benefits of a republic, a form of government based on popular consent and control. It is considered almost unanimously by scholars to be if not the first, then certainly the most important, work on republicanism in the early modern period.^[1]

Outline

If The Prince resembles a guidebook based primarily on empirical observations, Machiavelli wrote the Discourses as a commentary on Livy's work on Roman history. However, both books include empirical observations and historical generalizations. Machiavelli himself does not make a sharp distinction between the two methods of inquiry, as he thinks that all ages are fundamentally similar. He thinks we can use both methods to teach ourselves the unchanging laws of the political universe.

The book is strictly speaking three books in one. In Book I Machiavelli focuses on the internal structure of the republic. Book II is about matters of warfare. Book III is perhaps most similar to the teachings of The Prince, as it concerns individual leadership. The three books combined provide guidance to those trying to establish or reform a republic.

Reception and reaction

Francesco Guicciardini, Machiavelli's friend, read the book and wrote critical notes (Considerazioni) on many of the chapters. Jean-Jacques Rousseau considered the Discourses (as well as the Florentine Histories) to be more representative of Machiavelli's true philosophy: "Machiavelli was a proper man and a good citizen; but, being attached to the court of the Medici, he could not help veiling his love of liberty in the midst of his country's oppression. The choice of his detestable hero, Cesare Borgia, clearly enough shows his hidden aim; and the contradiction between the teaching of the Prince and that of the Discourses on Livy and the History of Florence shows that this profound political thinker has so far been studied only by superficial or corrupt readers. The Court of Rome sternly prohibited his book. I can well believe it; for it is that Court it most clearly portrays." - Rousseau, The Social Contract, Book III.

Notes

Further reading

• Full Text of the Discourses, courtesy: Liberty Fund, Inc.
• Harvey Mansfield, "New Modes and Orders, A study of the Discouses on Livy" University of Chicago, 2001.
• Leo Strauss, "Thoughts on Machiavelli," University of Chicago, 1958.
• Minowitz, Peter, “Machiavellianism Come of Age? Leo Strauss on Modernity and Economics,” The Political Science Reviewer 22 (1993) 157-97.
• Hans Baron, "The Composition and Structure of Machiavelli's Discorsi, Journal of the History of Ideas 14,1(1953), 136-156.
• Gisela Bock; Quentin Skinner; Maurizio Viroli, eds. Machiavelli and Republicanism (Cambridge: 1990).
• John M. Najemy, "Baron's Machiavelli and Renaissance Republicanism," American Historical Review 101,1(1996), 119-129. Abstract: examines Hans Baron's ambivalent portrayal of Machiavelli (see The Crisis of the Early Italian Renaissance: civic humanism and republican liberty in an age of classicism and tyranny, [Princeton: 1955]). He argues that Baron tended to see Machiavelli simultaneously as the cynical debunker and the faithful heir of civic humanism. By the mid-1950's, Baron had come to consider civic humanism and Florentine republicanism as early chapters of a much longer history of European political liberty, a story in which Machiavelli and his generation played a crucial role. This conclusion led Baron to modify his earlier negative view of Machiavelli. He tried to bring the Florentine theorist under the umbrella of civic humanism by underscoring the radical differences between The Prince and the Discourses and thus revealing the fundamentally republican character of the Discourses. However, Baron's inability to come to terms with Machiavelli's harsh criticism of early 15th-century commentators such as Leonardo Bruni ultimately prevented him from fully reconciling Machiavelli with civic humanism.
• J.G.A. Pocock, The Machiavellian Moment: Florentine Political Thought and the Atlantic Republican Tradition (Princeton: 2003; 1975). Abstract: traces the Machiavellian belief in and emphasis upon Greco-Roman ideals of unspecialized civic virtue and liberty from 15th-century Florence through 17th-century England and Scotland to 18th- and even early 19th-century America. Thinkers who shared these ideals tended to believe that the ultimate political goal of human (male) liberty depended entirely on the maintenance of civic virtue; the latter in turn required a freehold in land (property ownership), and was optimally defended through the possession of arms (in this context most usually, but not always, firearms).
• J.G.A. Pocock, "The Machiavellian Moment Revisited: a Study in History and Ideology," Journal of Modern History 53,1(1981), 49-72.