Machiavelli Against Sovereignty: Emergency Powers and the Decemvirate

• Published date: 01 October 2024
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00905917241226670
• Author: Eero Arum
• Date: 01 October 2024

https://doi.org/10.1177/00905917241226670

Political Theory

2024, Vol. 52(5) 697 –725

© The Author(s) 2024

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DOI: 10.1177/00905917241226670

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Article

Machiavelli Against

Sovereignty: Emergency

Powers and the

Decemvirate

Eero Arum1

Abstract

This article argues that Machiavelli’s chapters on the Decemvirate (D

1.35, 1.40-45) advance an internal critique of the juridical discourse of

sovereignty. I first contextualize these chapters in relation to several of

Machiavelli’s potential sources, including Livy’s Ab urbe condita, Dionysius

of Halicarnassus’s Roman Antiquities, and the antiquarian writings of Andrea

Fiocchi and Giulio Pomponio Leto. I then analyze Machiavelli’s claim that

the decemvirs held “absolute authority” (autorità assoluta)—an authority

that was unconstrained by either laws or countervailing magistrates. I

proceed to argue that Machiavelli’s account of the decemvirs’ election

contains a web of allusions to the lex regia, the “royal law” by which the

Roman people were thought to have conveyed their sovereign power

to an emperor. By modeling the decemvirs’ election on the lex regia,

Machiavelli reveals the political limitations of the doctrine of popular

sovereignty; moreover, he illustrates that even free and fair elections can

easily give rise to tyranny.

Keywords

Machiavelli, sovereignty, absolutism, elections, emergency powers

1PhD Student, Department of Political Science, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA

Corresponding Author:

Eero Arum, PhD Student, UC Berkeley, 210 Social Sciences Building, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.

Email: eero.arum@berkeley.edu

1226670PTXXXX10.1177/00905917241226670Political TheoryArum

research-article2024

698 Political Theory 52(5)

1. Mommsen and Krueger 1872, 6.

2. Citations of the Discourses on Livy (hereafter D) indicate passages by book and

chapter number, with reference to Bausi’s Italian edition (Machiavelli 2001).

English translations are based on Mansfield and Tarcov (Machiavelli 1996), with

frequent modifications.

Princeps legibus solutus est.

“The prince is unbound by the laws.”1

—Ulpian, Dig. 1.3.31

[U]n principe sciolto dalle leggi sarà ingrato, vario e imprudente.

“A prince unbound by the laws will be ungrateful, fickle, and imprudent.”

—Machiavelli, Discourses on Livy, 1.582

The past two decades have been marked by a surge of interest in the concep-

tual history of emergency powers (see Agamben 2005 [2003]; Ferejohn and

Pasquino 2004, 211–21; Geuna 2015; Gross and Ni Aoláin 2006; Levinson

and Balkin 2010, 1799–1805; Nippel 2012; Straumann 2016). Following

Schmitt (2014 [1921], 4–7), recent studies often begin with Discourses on

Livy (see Ferejohn and Pasquino 2004, 211; Levinson and Balkin 2010, 1799;

Nippel 2012, 35–36), where Machiavelli argues that “dictatorial authority” is

necessary for the preservation and prosperity of republics (D 1.34). Curiously,

however, the secondary literature tends to omit Machiavelli’s discussion of an

equally important emergency magistracy: the Decemvirate of 451–449 B.C.E.,

an extraordinary commission created for the drafting and enactment of the XII

Tables. This is a notable omission, not only because Machiavelli’s chapters on

the Decemvirate touch upon several crucial themes of his political thought—

including tyranny, constitutional change, and the limits of electoral politics—

but also because a proper treatment of this subject is necessary for understanding

his chapter on the Dictatorship itself. As we will see, these chapters also play

a central role in the broader political project of the Discourses: through his

analysis of the decemvirs’ “absolute authority” (autorità assoluta), Machiavelli

advances an internal critique of the juridical discourse of sovereignty.

Machiavelli develops his views on emergency powers by juxtaposing the

Dictatorship and the Decemvirate. This comparative analysis serves a dual

argumentative function. On the one hand, Machiavelli demonstrates the

need for regularized institutional responses to unpredictable emergencies,

arguing in favor of the “limited authority” (autorità limitate) of the dictators

(D 1.34; see McCormick 1993, esp. 896–98). Conversely, Machiavelli wor-

ries that emergency powers will be abused without adequate constitutional

safeguards; he therefore warns against the model of the Decemvirate, in

which “absolute authority” was bestowed on a committee of patrician