ABSTRACT
Distraction is an invaluable tool. This anecdote would be no more than trivia, if martial subterfuge weren't so prominent in civilized life. War is at the heart of modern politics, and nowhere is this demonstrated with more honesty and clarity than in Niccolo Machiavelli's The Prince. In this classic treatise on statecraft, the Renaissance Florentine revealed how crucial military know-how was for good statesmanship. In order to capture and keep foreign territories, the prince required keen sense of strategy and tactics. The most compelling vision of democratic ideal was provided by Greek-born political philosopher Cornelius Castoriadis. Far from being Castoriadis's ideal democracy, contemporary politics is closer to Machiavelli's perpetual war. Philosophers like Zeno, Pythagoras and Aristotle might have been arrogant and a little out of touch with everyday proles but they weren't destructive. Like all social and political philosophies, Lucius Seneca's Stoicism had its shortcomings. Missing from its theory was a concern for the cultivation of sentiment or passion.
