histofthought1

192 Economic thought before Adam Smithboils down to achieving greatness and glory by maintaining and expandingtheir power. The modern policy scientists eschew moral principles as being'unscientific' and therefore outside their sphere of interest.In all this, modern social science is a faithful follower ofthe wily Florentineopportunist. But in one important sense the two differ. For Niccolo Machiavellinever had the presumption - or the cunning - to claim to be a true scientistbecause he is 'value-free'. There is no pretend value-freedom in Old Nick.He has simply replaced the goals of Christian virtue by another contrastingset of moral principles: that of maintaining and expanding the power of theprince. As Skinner writes:it is often claimed that the originality of Machiavelli's argument. ..lies in the factthat he divorces politics from morality, and in consequence emphasises the 'autonomyof politics' ...[but] the difference between Machiavelli and his contemporariescannot adequately be characterized as a difference between a moral view ofpolitics and a view of politics as divorced from morality. The essential contrast israther between two different moralities - two rival and incompatible accounts ofwhat ought ultimately to be done. 4Modern social scientists, in contrast, pride themselves on being realisticand value-free. But in this, ironically, they are far less realistic or perhaps lesscandid than their Florentine mentor. For, as Machiavelli knew full well, intaking on their role of adviser to the rulers of state, the 'value-free scientist'is willy-nilly, committing himself to the end, and therefore to the overridingmorality, of strengthening the power of those rulers. In advocating publicpolicy, if nowhere else, value-freedom is a snare and a delusion; Old Nickwas either too honest or too much of a realist even to consider thinkingotherwise.Niccolo Machiavelli, therefore, was both the founder of modern politicalscience and a notable preacher of evil. In casting out Christian or natural lawmorality, however, he did not presume to claim to be 'value-free' as do hismodern followers; he knew full well that he was advocating the new moralityof subordinating all other considerations to power and to the reasons of state.Machiavelli was the philosopher and apologist par excellence for the untrammelled,unchecked power of the absolute state.Some historians like to contrast the 'bad' Machiavelli of The Prince withthe 'good' Machiavelli of his later though less influential Discourses. Failingto convince the Medicis of his change of heart, Machiavelli reverted, in theDiscourses, to his republican leanings. But the Old Nick of the Discourses isin no sense transformed by goodness; he is simply adapting his doctrine to arepublican as against a monarchical polity.Obviously, as a republican Machiavelli can no longer stress the virtu andthe greatness of the prince, and so he shifts ground to a kind of collective