ISBN: Ostalo
Godina izdanja: .
Jezik: Engleski
Autor: Strani

How to wield power in the modern world

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Illustrating each of Machiavelli’s maxims with a description of events that occurred during Tony Blair`s time as prime minister, Blair`s former close adviser gives a devastating, frank, and insightful analysis of how power is wielded in the modern world


The New Machiavelli by Jonathan Powell - review
Tom Clark gains an insider`s perspective on the Blair years
This is a book concerned with two reputations. But unusually for a memoir – which, despite protestations, it is – the concern is not with the standing of the author. Rather, Jonathan Powell is concerned with the reputation of Tony Blair, whom he served as chief of staff, and that of Machiavelli. The 15th-century Florentine courtier`s musings serve as the peg for the modern courtier to hang his memories on. Although a good read, I don`t think either big name is salvaged.

Taking Machiavelli first, Powell marshals voices from Napoleon to Isaiah Berlin to remind us what an extraordinary work Machiavelli`s The Prince is. It grapples with the political arts in states made up of real people, as opposed to peddling high principles for idealised citizens as other philosophers do. `Machiavellian`, Powell explains, need not always mean double-dealing cruelty, for there are times when straight-talking mercy is, in the New Labour phrase, `what works` best in power play. But the actual lessons he distils from the Florentine fox are hardly warm – premiers, we read, should err on the side of sacking more colleagues, since dispensability is their `whole point`. Fascinated by the bloodthirsty Cesare Borgia, Machiavelli emerges as – at best – amoral as opposed to immoral.

By documenting Blair`s undoubted Machiavellian virtues – hugging the powerful close, playing on popular feeling – Powell will not win him many new admirers. No doubt No 10 played by the Florentine handbook in pursuing private influence over public glories with George W Bush. But Powell`s honest account only underlines the meagre returns. The supposed success was in getting the Americans to make war through the UN route, but they soon went alone anyway, and hopes that Baghdad was a staging-post to peace for Palestine were a delusion.

At home, Powell argues Blair bequeathed a high-quality mixed economy in public services that will endure as the `Butskellist` settlement when the 1950s Conservatives accepted Attlee`s reforms. With vast cuts looming, however, this seems naive. Dissatisfaction with the total resourcing available for education, social care and the rest of it will soon overwhelm arguments about the merits of foundation hospitals or academy schools.

Powell, whom Peter Mandelson dubbed Jeeves, echoes his master`s recent identification of Freedom of Information and the hunting ban as his great blunders. On the first, Powell makes a more reasoned argument than his boss – about the confused job spec of the information commissioner – for the arch-insider`s perspective. On hunting, he adds extraordinary detail about the lengths to which No 10 went to thwart the ban, including a suggestion from Blair himself for fitting hounds with electric collars that could stun them just before the kill. Amusement aside, one of Blair`s few supposed regrets is revealed as a sham – an apology for something he fought against.

If Powell falters in salvaging two reputations, he is persuasive in shredding a third – that of Gordon Brown. There are some tribal judgments: Blair`s courting of Murdoch was shrewd, whereas Brown should have `saved his dignity` with Paul Dacre. There is also some hammed-up history, with Brown`s aide Ed Balls likened to `Quintus Fabius, who fell under the influence of the tyrant Appius`.

But Powell is more devastating when he calmly tells tales about the neighbour from hell: how Brown would blame Blair for Cameron`s rise, question his Christianity and demand that he `stop` journalists writing mean things. The boss, however, was not psychologically capable of a Machiavellian response, and there is a rare Blairite admission that Tony had indeed `given Gordon to understand` that he would soon take over. When Powell asked Blair why he wasted so long talking to someone who makes his life miserable, Blair asks whether his top aide has ever been `in love`. A joke, perhaps, but one that reveals Blair`s shortcomings as a Machiavellian prince.

Blair himself has told most of the best stories, but Powell adds colour and insight. His endearing inclusion of personally unflattering stories, such as his demand for a special red box with `chief of staff` emblazoned on it, lend the book credibility. He has an eye for droll detail, recalling being barred from a royal barbeque because of fears that his unmarried relationship would set Prince Charles a bad example, and recounting security blowing up a box of fudge that Charles had sent to Tony.

While no anatomy of Britain, this book also sheds valuable light on the operation of power. At home, it is instructive on the difficulties of getting a grip on the civil service, and on the peculiarities of prime ministerial power – which Powell rightly describes as a power to appoint, not to direct. On foreign policy, his real expertise, he details with authority how Europe does and doesn`t work, in a chapter that all budding statesmen should study.

So there are several good reasons to pick up this book, even if you are one of those idealists whose political interests go beyond `how to acquire a princedom and how to hang on to it`. That was Machiavelli`s interest, and Powell leaves me wondering whether it was really Blair`s too.

Tom Clark is co-author, with Robert D Putnam and Edward Fieldhouse, of The Age of Obama (Manchester).