Machiavelli was the first thinker in the European tradition to argue that a state could remain stable with more than one political party competing against each other, rather than requiring one party to annihilate the other.

Ada Palmer highlights an overlooked Machiavellian innovation: contrary to the prevailing assumption that factions must fight until one is exterminated, Machiavelli (citing Siena) argued competing parties could coexist and stabilize a state by venting tension through ongoing rivalry. ✦ AI generated

Ada Palmer · Dwarkesh Podcast · 2026-06-16 · original ↗

Machiavelli is the first person that we have ever in the European tradition to suggest that it could be viable for there to be more than one political party in a state at the same time, and that they would compete against each other and vent the society’s tension through competition and vie to try to dominate an election and then the next one.

verbatim transcript · starts at 15:08