Guicciardini Dialogue on the Government of Florence [Paperback]

First English translation of an influential justification of the priority of state interest.Arguing for the priority of state interest, like Machiavelli, his contemporary and friend, Guicciardini acknowledged the important role of patronage and graft in politics as well as the illegitimacy of nearly all forms of political power. This edition is the first English translation of his classic 1520s work.Arguing for the priority of state interest, like Machiavelli, his contemporary and friend, Guicciardini acknowledged the important role of patronage and graft in politics as well as the illegitimacy of nearly all forms of political power. This edition is the first English translation of his classic 1520s work.This is the first English translation of Guicciardini's Dialogue on the Government of Florence, written in the 1520s. Like Machiavelli, his more famous contemporary and friend, Guicciardini rejects classical republican arguments in the name of the new political realism and acknowledges the important role of patronage and graft in contemporary politics and the illegitimacy of nearly all forms of political power, arguing for the priority of state interest over private morality and religion.Acknowledgements; Introduction; Principal events in Guicciardini's life; Bibliographical note; Dialogue on the government of Florence; Preface; Book I; Book II; Appendix: selected maxims; Biographical notes; Glossary; Index of names; Index of subjects.