Machiavelli, Civic Virtue, and the Problem of Stability

Abstract

This paper reconstructs the classical republicans’ interest in civic virtue as an attempt to address what Rawls terms the problem of stability – specifically, as an attempt to work out what configuration of public institutions would be most congruent with the dispositions of character it tends to generate in citizens, and thus constitutes a self-sustaining political order, or what Machiavelli termed a “well-ordered republic” (republica bene ordinata). Various views and debates in the classical republican tradition on this topic are discussed, with particular attention to Machiavelli’s discussion of social equality and inequality.

Keywords: Civic virtue, stability, republicanism, Machiavelli