Manipulating Perspectives In Tomas More’s Utopia: Cruelty Or Generosity
More’s Utopia critiques the effectiveness how a society functions through imagining one where everything is harmonious. More is able to present his ideas and beliefs of society in a logical way through observation of its structure. In Utopia there is low crime, no poverty or drastic class distinctions. He encourages the people to value knowledge, honesty, and practice good values, rather than be preoccupied with vanity and greed. Machiavelli believes that a prince needs to be cunning like a fox and strong like a lion. The fox represents the important skill of manipulation a prince must possess. He must know how to gauge his subject’s attitudes towards him and act accordingly to maintain his reputation. Machiavelli’s ideas of princely power emphasize the importance of being feared or loved and the role cruelty plays in securing one's power. More allows the ruler to practice this concept through the use of forced labor as cruelty.
The ruler treats precious metals strategically, giving them no value. He convinces his subjects that these metals are worthless by equating them with subjugation and inferiority. More created a society where gold is used to make a mockery of slaves. By manipulating people in this way he preserves wealth for when he truly requires it and uses the enslaved people as examples in order to incite fear in his people. However, Utopian citizens are not the only slaves in Utopia. The slaves are made up of prisoners of war from foreign territories taken in battle or criminals sentenced to slavery, the harshest punishment for Utopians. Foreign slaves do not share the same beliefs when it comes to the treatment of metals. Utopian slavery is not raced based, or generational, two distinctions that make it humane. In combination of the use of gold as a means to make a mockery, it would cause foreign slaves to see the ruler as compassionate when considering their treatment. Being feared by your own people while loved by conquered enemies creates the optimal setup for maintaining power. Using Machiavelli’s ideas of manipulating people's perspectives, Utopian slavery shows cruelty to Utopian slaves and generosity to foreign slaves. This secures power for Utopia through the balance of fear and love.
In The Prince Machiavelli establishes that “It is best to be both feared and loved, however, if one cannot be both it is better to be feared than loved. ' Machiavelli’s ideas of cruelty go hand in hand with the state More created in Utopia. Machiavelli emphasized that cruelty is necessary and how it is important to use examples extremely public acts of cruelty to keep the people safe, law abiding, and obedient. However weather it is better to be feared than loved is one of Machiavelli’s primary concerns. Love and fear are the root of all human emotion, with most one emotion being traceable to one source. Machiavelli sees love as a powerful emotion that can be taken advantage of. It is our nature to support someone or something we love. However, love is dangerous because it comes and goes and a ruler who is loved is not always respected. Many other things may affect the love one may have like other rulers or weakening power. Love is too hard to maintain because it requires many to be satisfied to their own degree, which is often impossible. Fear is more powerful because it relates to survival and fear feeds off itself unlike love. A feared ruler has more support because their subjects fear the consequences of not supporting. In short, it's better to be feared than loved, in order for a ruler to be successful he should evoke fear but avoid being excessively cruel. This way a ruler is able to maintain power but also have his subjects maintain their respect for him.
Slavery in Utopia is not generational or based on race, rather the slaves are prisoners of war, poor foreigners, Utopian criminals or criminals sentenced to death in other countries. Machiavelli emphasizes the importance of being loved and feared. By creating a slavery system that is humane in comparison to ones we have seen historically it allows the system to be used strategically as it is devoid of any moral complications. Utopia’s devaluing of gold relates to the principles of cruelty and compassion (through generosity) that Machiavelli emphasized. As slaves were often from other countries we can assume they did not devalue gold like Utopians. While Utopians consider gold to be degrading and cruel, slaves would see it as adornment. This however, only applies to foreign slaves who still hold onto their value for material goods. Foreign slaves have feelings of love due to the assumed generosity they think they are receiving. The acceptance of the gold as adornment makes the slaves examples of the dangers of vanity to the people. As for Utopian slaves, this is being the cruelest punishment making them fear their ruler. Utopian slaves are treated so cruelly because they were given the opportunity to live free, in a harmonious society however, acted on their impulses.
Niccolo Machiavelli explains what qualities a prince should have and how he should run his empire to maintain power. Although both fear and love would be ideal together he believes that if a prince were to choose, that he should choose to be feared. While living under fear is not enjoyable for his subjects, a feared prince is a stronger leader than a loved prince. The strongest ruler however is one who has both, the next best is one who is only feared, the weakest only depends on love. Through slavery in Utopia this duality is achievable. By appearing cruel to your people and generous to foreigners a ruler is able to secure power through fear and love.
