Fortune and irony in international politics: Martin Wight and Machiavelli’s legacy

The idea that political action takes place in a volatile context, which con- strains decisions and affects outcomes, is an essential aspect of Niccolò Machiavelli’s political thought. In fact, historical forces such as fortune and irony play a central role in many of his works. He sees fortuna as the force that conditions political action and tends to thwart it. Machiavelli’s attempt to describe the limits of freedom and the dilemmas imposed by these limits on political action has been echoed by Martin Wight in his essay ‘Fortune’s Banter’. By presenting a critical appraisal of political realism and a rejection of political determinism, this article tries to assess Machiavelli’s legacy in Wight’s thought. I aim to show how Machiavelli’s ideas represent a cornerstone of Wight’s analysis, which is based on classical notions such as irony, tragedy, necessity and, of course, fortune. Drawing on an in-depth analysis of Wight’s so-far unpublished work, this article also examines some crucial aspects of the causal and moral complexity that surrounds political action and its analysis.