The 48 Laws of Power Book Notes

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The 48 Laws of Power Book Notes

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Looking back on human history, you will find that there has been no time in which people did not play games of power. The real world is complicated and we often have wonderful aspirations which are out of our reach. Rather than passively respond to complex situations, we should proactively study the laws of power. This book analyses a large number of case studies of successes and failures, and summarizes 48 laws of success to help us take the initiative and develop our abilities for when we find ourselves in complicated situations.

Overview | Chapter 1

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Many people see power as a subject that refers to political tactics, which has nothing to do with them. As long as we are honest with others and stay away from political games, then surely we can avoid power struggles. But in fact, this is just a naïve and fanciful way of thinking.

Niccolò Machiavelli, the Italian political thinker and author of The Prince, once said: “Any man who tries to be good all the time is bound to come to ruin among the great number who are not good.” In human society the game of power is always being played, from grand political schemes to various struggles in our personal lives. Everybody lives in a game of power, playing either an active role or a passive role, and none of us can avoid it.

Some people believe that playing power games is insidious and immoral, and yet power has nothing to do with morality. Power is a concept that goes beyond ethics; it is the skill and ability to perceive changes in the situation and to make decisions based on objective reality and desired results rather than on the moral intentions of the opponent.

Human nature is complex. People have a civilized and noble side, but they have a cunning and dark side, too. In order to reach their goals, people often use all kinds of ways to camouflage and conceal. How should we protect ourselves from being confused or used by others? How can we clearly see the real motivations behind their actions through so many layers of fog? How can we make correct decisions? This book shows us how we can have our own strength in the struggle for power.

The authors of this book are American author Robert Greene and publisher Joost Elffers. Robert is a freelance writer as well as an editor and script writer. To write The 48 Laws of Power, he quit his job and plunged into a sea of literature, reading over 200 books and collecting a huge amount of historical material spanning more than 3000 years. He analyzed a great number of historical cases of failures and successes, and from this, he concluded the 48 laws of power and set forth his idea of the principles and rules of power.

The power described in this book doesn’t just refer to political tactics but to more general concepts too, and can be understood as a kind of control and manipulation. Of course, here we also need to remind you that the values and morality of “obtaining power is the ultimate goal” described in the book are a little skewed, so we should look at them with a critical eye. However, the laws of power unlocked in this book contain insights which are profound and thought-provoking.