Giovanni Botero

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Giovanni Botero
Born1544
Bene Vagienna, Savoyard state
Died23 June 1617 (aged 72–73)
Turin, Savoyard state
Resting placeChiesa dei Santi Martiri
Education
Notable work
Reason of state
National interest

Giovanni Botero (c. 1544 – 1617) was an Italian thinker, priest, poet, and diplomat, author of Della Ragion di Stato (The Reason of State),[1] in ten chapters, printed in Venice in 1589, and of Universal Relations, (Rome, 1591), addressing the world geography and ethnography.[2] With his emphasis that the wealth of cities was caused by adding value to raw materials, Botero may be considered the ancestor of both Mercantilism[3] and Cameralism.[4]

Early life

Born around 1544 in

Jesuit college in Palermo at the age of 15. A year later, he moved to the Roman College, he was introduced to the teaching of some of the most influential Catholic thinkers of the sixteenth century, including Juan de Mariana, who, in his On the King and the Education of the King, would argue for the popular overthrow of tyrannical rulers [5]

In 1565, Botero was sent to teach philosophy and rhetoric at the Jesuit colleges in France, first in Billom, and then in Paris. The second half of the sixteenth century saw the kingdom dramatically, and often violently divided by the French Wars of Religion. Paris especially was heating up during Botero's stay there from 1567 to 1569, and he was recalled to Italy after getting too caught up in the excitement, apparently for his involvement in an anti-Spanish protest.

Botero spent the 1570s drifting from one

temporal power, he was discharged from the Jesuit order in 1580.[6]

Secretary and diplomat

Botero's life took a major turn at this time when he was commissioned by Bishop Carlo Borromeo of Milan as a personal assistant. Borromeo introduced Botero to the practical side of Church administration, often socializing with the nobility of northern Italy, most notably Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy. When the Bishop died in 1584, Botero continued his service to the family as assistant to Carlo Borromeo's nephew, Federico.[7]

Before his work with Federico began, however, Botero took part in a diplomatic mission to France on behalf of Charles Emmanuel. For most of 1585, Botero was in Paris, discussing affairs of the day, and perhaps overhearing the conspiratorial debate on whether the pope would grant licence for the French

Calvinists
. The license was never granted, and the offensive was postponed and made more modest, but this conspiracy tells of what kind of political debate was being had, and just what kind of trouble there was in 1580s France.

Works and thought

Della ragion di stato, 1589

By the late 1580s, Botero had already published a few works, most notably an epic-style poem dedicated to

Thomas Malthus, here Botero outlines the generative and nutritive virtues of a city, the former being the rate of human reproduction, and the latter being the ability of the products of the city and its countryside to maintain the people. Cities grow when their nutritive virtue is greater than the generative, but at the inevitable point when these virtues are inverted, the city begins to die.[8]

In 1589, Botero completed his most famous work, Della ragion di Stato (The Reason of State). In this work, Botero argues that a prince's power must be based on some form of consent of his subjects, and princes must make every effort to win the people's affection and admiration. This differed from Machiavelli's philosophy in that it is not sufficient to seem like a just prince, for one's true nature will always shine through; one must actually be a just prince by the advice Botero lays out.[9]

Botero's idea of justness came from his exposure to

God-given absolute sovereignty of kings that were being proffered by Protestant theologians in the early sixteenth century, and by political thinkers like the French jurist Jean Bodin at the end of the century.[10]

Jean Bodin's influential Six Books of the Republic was an important influence on Botero's writing of the Reason of State, even if, as with Machiavelli's Prince, much of that influence was negative. While Botero disagrees with Bodin's thought on sovereignty, preferring something more popularly based, he does agree with some of Bodin's economic ideas. Nonetheless, Botero's overall conception of political economy is again more 'liberal' than that of Bodin, who argued for active participation by kings in the economy of the country, including

Louis XIV and Colbert. Bodin cautioned kings only against trading with their own subjects; all other economic activity was allowed. Botero, on the other hand, argued that there were only three cases where the prince could take part in trade: 1) if no private citizen could afford it, 2) if a single private citizen would grow too powerful by the profits of it, or 3) there were some shortfall in supply whereby the prince would have to aid in the distribution of goods. Ultimately, Botero argued that economic activity was unbecoming a prince, and that the people were to be the prime economic mover in the state.[11]

Murray Rothbard argued that the differences between Machiavelli's and Botero's formulations of the reason of state were only nominally different, describing Botero's criticism of Machiavelli as 'merely a ritualistic cover for Botero's adoption of the essence of Machiavellian thought.'[12]

Later works, life, and influence

Through the 1590s, Botero continued in the employ of Federico Borromeo, who would become Archbishop of Milan in 1595. Botero mixed in the high society of Rome and Milan in these years, and published another work for which he was to become quite well known, the Relazioni Universali. Released in four volumes between 1591 and 1598 (a fifth volume was finally published in the late nineteenth century), the 'relations' of the title referred to those of the 'universal' (Catholic) church in various parts of the world, a treatise on "The Strength of all the Powers of Europe and Asia", and even includes the Americas. The work marks the beginning of demographic studies.[13]

Finishing his employment with Federico Borromeo in 1599, Botero returned to the

Count-Duke of Olivares.[citation needed
]

Here is where Botero's work began to have an influence. Olivares seems to have used Botero's Reason of State to outline the strategy for preserving the

Catholic reform and a leading figure of the Thirty Years' War, had discussed the Reason of State with his advisors. Thus, Botero's thought was able to shape at least some of the policies among the European states of the very troubled seventeenth century.[14]

Botero's work would also influence the next generation of political and economic thinkers. Thomas Mun's liberal mercantilist treatise England's Treasure by Foreign Trade, written in 1624, but not published until 1664, owes something to the Reason of State, and there is evidence that the great Belgian thinker Justus Lipsius read the Reason of State.[15]

Botero died in Turin in 1617.[16]

See also

  • Botero (surname)
    . Italian surname

Citations

  1. ^ Botero, Giovanni, Pamela Waley, Daniel Philip Waley, and Robert Peterson. 1956. The Reason of State / The Greatness of Cities / Transl. by Robert Peterson 1606. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
  2. ^ Botero, Giovanni, and Robert Johnson. 1601. The Vvorlde, or an Historicall Description of the Most Famous Kingdomes and Common-Weales Therein. Imprinted at London: By Edm. Bollifant, for Iohn Iaggard.
  3. ^ Perrotta, Cosimo (2012). "Botero, Giovanni - Il Contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero – Economia". Treccani Enciclopedia Italiana (in Italian). Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani S.p.A. Retrieved 24 February 2022.
  4. ^ Reinert, Erik S., and Fernanda A. Reinert. 2019. “33 Economic Bestsellers Published before 1750.” The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought 1–58. doi: 10.1080/09672567.2018.1523211, p.1212.
  5. ISBN 978-3-319-02848-4. Retrieved 24 February 2022. {{cite book}}: |website= ignored (help
    )
  6. ^ Firpo, Luigi (1971). "Botero, Giovanni - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani". Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani (in Italian). Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani S.p.A. Retrieved 24 February 2022.
  7. ^ Perrotta, Cosimo (2012). "Botero, Giovanni - Il Contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero – Economia". Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani (in Italian). Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani S.p.A. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  8. ^ Continisio, Chiara (2012). "Botero, Giovanni - Il Contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero – Diritto". Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani (in Italian). Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani S.p.A. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  9. ^ Reinert, Erik S. (April 2020). "Industrial policy: A long-term perspective and overview of theoretical arguments" (PDF). ucl.ac.uk/iipp. UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  10. ^ Ghiringhelli, Robertino (2012). "Botero, Giovanni - Il Contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero – Filosofia". Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani (in Italian). Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani S.p.A. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  11. ISBN 9781107141827. Retrieved 25 February 2022. {{cite book}}: |website= ignored (help
    )
  12. ^ kanopiadmin (2010-03-24). "Giovanni Botero: The First Malthusian". Mises Institute. Retrieved 2023-03-25.
  13. ^ Perrotta, Cosimo (2012). "Botero, Giovanni - Il Contributo italiano alla storia del Pensiero – Economia". Enciclopedia Italiana Treccani (in Italian). Istituto della Enciclopedia Italiana fondata da Giovanni Treccani S.p.A. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  14. ^ "Botero, Giovanni". Encyclopedia of Population. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  15. ^ Reinert, Erik S. (April 2020). "Industrial policy: A long-term perspective and overview of theoretical arguments" (PDF). ucl.ac.uk/iipp. UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. Retrieved 25 February 2022.
  16. ^ Pantaleoni, Matteo. "Botero - Faculty of Social Sciences". socialsciences.mcmaster.ca. Retrieved 25 February 2022.

References

  • Aquinas, St. Thomas, On Law, Morality, and Ethics. Edited, with an introduction by William J. Baumgarth and Richard S. Regan. Indianapolis, 1988.
  • Bireley, Robert, The Counter-Reformation Prince: Anti-Machiavellianism or Catholic Statecraft in Early Modern Europe. Chapel Hill, 1990.
  • Botero, Giovanni, The Reason of State, translated by P.J. Waley and D.P. Waley, with notes by D.P. Waley. New Haven, 1956.
  • Brodrick, James, The Economic Morals of the Jesuits. New York, 1972.
  • Grice-Hutchinson, Marjorie, The School of Salamanca: Readings in Spanish Monetary Theory, 1544 - 1605. Oxford, 1952.
  • Hamilton, Bernice, Political Thought in Sixteenth Century Spain. Oxford, 1963.
  • O'Malley, John W., The First Jesuits. Cambridge, 1993.
  • Skinner, Quentin, The Foundations of Modern Political Thought, Vol. I: The Renaissance; Vol. II: The Age of Reformation. Cambridge, 1978.

External links

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