L'amicizia nel Principe

This article sheds light on Machiavelli’s view of friendship as a political relationship. As the comparison between Platina’s De Principe and Machiavelli’s The Prince makes clear, the political anthropology, the political ontology and the vision of the world on which Machiavelli realistic idea of politics hinges imply that neither the relationship between a prince and his subjects nor that between the prince and his chosen advisers can be conceived as a form of friendship. What is at stake is not only a new conception of the political meanings and functions of the relationship between a prince and his subjects, according to which friends are unreliable and dangerous allies, but also a new way of conceiving politics, which revolves around the choice of enemies.