Chapter 5 Terms/Notes Flashcards
the Italian renaissance political philosopher whose book of advice to would-be leaders, “The Prince” (1532), is the progenitor of all how-to-succeed books. His amoral tone and detached analysis have caused him to be both soundly denounced as well as greatly imitated.
Machiavellian
refers to cunning, cynical, and ruthless behavior based on the notion of the end justifying the use of almost any means
Machiavellianism
What is the Machiavellian set of ideas about obtaining power, holding power, and using power to gain advantage?
- men should either be treated generously or destroyed, because they take revenge for slight injuries-for heavy ones they cannot.
- princes ought to leave affairs of reproach to the management of others, and keep those of grace in their own hands.
- it is necessary for him who lays out a state and arranges laws for it to presuppose that all men are evil and that they are always going to act according to the wickedness of their spirits whenever they have free scope.
- princes who have achieved great things have been those who have given their word lightly, who have known how to trick men with their cunning, and who, in the end, have overcome those abiding by honest principles.
the reputation and built-up business of a company. It can generally valued as what a company would sell for above the value of its physical property, money owed to it, and other assets.
goodwill
intellectual weight.
gravitas
in religion, an offense committed by a holder of high office. The term has been popularized to cover the commission of any action considered a demeaning of the responsibilities of office by the holder of that office.
scandal
The South Vietnamese village where hundreds of old men, women, and children were murdered in 1968 by a U.S. Army unit commanded by Lieutenant William Calley Jr. Despite complaints by several soldiers, the U.S. Army sought to ignore or cover up this atrocity until congressional inquiries and press reports forced a comprehensive investigation that led to Calley’s court martial.
My Lai
the disinterested use of one’s official position,one’s office, to help others settle their differences; an offer to mediate a dispute.
good offices
the U.S. backed “democratic resistance movement” in Nicaragua.
Contras
this Russian word for a bureaucrat is now used colloquially to refer to any administrative functionary.
Apparatchik
an executive’s granting of a release from the legal consequences of a criminal act.
pardon
decided on the basis of individual judgements that do not meet commonly understood rules of procedure and hence may not appear justifiable to those seeking to explain them to replicate them in similar circumstances
arbitrary
all recorded judicial and administrative agency decisions
case law
a german word, now absorbed into English, meaning the politics of realism; an injunction not to allow wishful thinking or sentimentality to cloud one’s judgement.
realpolitik
a group of citizens selected to review evidence against accused persons to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to bring the accused to trial to indict or not to indict.
Grand Jury
