The European Union’s ‘Machiavellian moment’

enlargement and the risk of overstretch

Abstract

In the Discourses on the First Decade of Titus Livius, Machiavelli pioneered the study of expanding commonwealths and their sustainability. He showed that expansion by ‘necessity’ resulted in ruin for a polity whose decision-making capacity and defence posture were not up to the challenge. Badly prepared expansion was poised to bring the commonwealth into a life-threatening crisis – a ‘Machiavellian moment’. Machiavelli’s framework of analysis provides most pertinent insights into the current predicament of the European Union and its enlargement drive.