With the heinous assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia, the attention of the Nationalist Party and its paying members was more focused on the protests against the government than on the election of its deputy leaders. Daphne’s murder made us reflect that good journalists are those who provoke our way of thinking. However, if those protesting were pursuing the Machiavellian idea that popular anger can bring a prince’s reign to an end, then they were mistaken. For this to happen, one needs unity, something which is completely lacking in the Opposition front.
In fact, Machiavelli argues that bad politicians have to be divisive and evil, if they want to remain in power and equates this with ‘good politics’. Politicians, Machiavelli continues, should not be concerned about spitefully taking evil decisions, as long as these decisions are taken to safe-guard the public good.
Following this peculiar reasoning, modern political thought coined the expression ‘ragion di stato’ or ‘a reason of state’. Power ceased to be something personal, as it had been throughout the Middle Ages, when it rested squarely on the figurehead of a monarch. Morality ceased to be linked to a lord or a pope as in medieval times. Instead, what was considered to be morally good began to be linked to what was good for the country and the state. From now onwards, society started to talk about a new public ethos. The new ethics were no longer based on Christian morality, linked to an eternal salvation. Instead, morality was associated with earthly living.
Thus immoral reasoning and corruption become acceptable, and even welcome, if they are being done for the good of the country. Hence, Machiavelli advised politicians to be ruthless. True leaders are those who put conscience aside. From the sixteenth century onwards, conscience started to be relegated to the private sphere.
This argument may appear confusing to many, in particular for those who following Daphne’s assassination are out protesting. But this murder is making us reflect on the ethics behind “ragion di Stato”. The discussion is not about the assassination per se, but about what is being perceived as our failed institutions. Others are wrongly interpreting this murder as a political occasion for the Opposition to tarnish Malta’s reputation abroad, damaging that favourable aspect that is causing our economy to boom. In both arguments, state interest reigns supreme.
Machiavelli insisted that politicians should not be praised for being morally sound and having a clean conscience. According to Machiavelli, a good politician is one who is a crook. And Daphne’s assassination has brought this aspect, that until now was missing, into public debate.
The reaction to this condition has become similar to Kafka’s writings. On the one side, liberal society wants us to continue doing politics in the Machiavellian manner based on the concept of ‘ragion di stato’ but at the same time, this same society is clamouring for a return to good moral principles for the sake of the public good.
There have been a number of car bombs in Malta but it is only this last murder that has exposed a need to bring back moral scruples into politics. Those protesting are demanding that conscience should once again take central stage. Politics, therefore, cannot be based on opportuneness and conscience cannot remain in the private realm.
Machiavelli’s belief was that a leader guided by public necessity is less likely to be cruel and vicious than one guided by morality derived from religious belief. The main idea was that a politician, who believed he had God on his side, was capable of everything. But history has already shown us that the most abominable crimes were committed by those who had removed God from the moral equation.
Many are attributing the present condition of moral decadence in Europe to the fact that this continent has abandoned its Christian principles. This is why I strongly believe that politicians like Edwin Vassallo have an important role to play in Maltese politics. Vassallo is showing that he is not a political hypocrite. He is not part of the group that, in the past, was supported by the local Curia because it pretended to be staunchly Catholic when in fact it was not. It professed itself to be virtuous, when in reality the group was in cahoots with a liberal faction whose only purpose was the annihilation of Christianity from Malta’s political equation. Indeed, this group has joined forces with what appears to be a funded political agenda to dechristianize Europe.
What has just been revealed in Italy about George Soros and the way how he, through his Open Society Foundation, has a number of European MEPs in his pocket, should be an eye opener to us all in Malta.
What matters in a republic is that the opinion of all citizens is taken into account and that no citizen is above the law; politicians included. In the days of Machiavelli, Christianity appeared as the sole political organisation capable of putting itself above the law. But today’s politicians are showing that secularism is capable of doing even worse things.
Edwin Vassallo is not one of those politicians who hide their true colours behind a façade of family values and Christian principles. He is not indifferent to the pains of the man in the street and has already shown that he is capable of making a difficult decision when the need arises.
Machiavelli believed that peace and security were more important than authenticity or honesty in politics. The latter two are the values that Vassallo made his own in the bid to become PN Deputy Leader for Parliamentary Affairs. At this moment in time, Vassallo appears also to be a politician capable of delivering peace and security to his party. Besides, he is capable of doing so without compromising either honesty or authenticity. He is certainly capable of taking tough and/or risky political decisions and has already proven this to the electorate. He has done so without having had the need to stake his political integrity.
Recent political events are revealing that he is a politician who displays no indecision. He is a man capable of exercising power in the name of the people without jeopardizing his moral integrity. I strongly believe that it is this type of leaders that the Nationalist Party desperately needs at this moment of its history.