The Remnant with Jonah Goldberg Machiavelli and Rational Control | Interview: Harvey Mansfield
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Mar 25, 2026 
Harvey Mansfield, longtime Harvard government professor and Straussian political philosopher. He unpacks Machiavelli’s effectual truth and contrasts reason with modern rationalism. They trace Christianity’s debt to Greek thought, critique Rawls and modern social science, and debate pragmatism, Marx, Locke, and the prospects for American conservatism.
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What Rational Control Means
- Rational control is using reason to impose unreason (rules or structures) to achieve goals without persuading people, exemplified by Cambridge speed bumps and social conventions like MS.
- Harvey Mansfield links this to Machiavelli's idea of replacing tradition with engineered conventions that act as liberation from old authorities.
Machiavelli's Comedy That Challenges Biblical Morality
- Mansfield analyzes Machiavelli's comedy where a pious married woman sleeps with a young man to secure a child, challenging biblical consistency.
- The play shows Machiavelli arguing that doing evil can produce good outcomes, undermining religious moral authority.
Rationalism Versus Full Reason
- Rationalism simplifies reason into single, testable proxies like self-interest, which eases exchange but flattens moral complexity.
- Mansfield contrasts this with Aristotelian virtues such as courage and moderation that can't be reduced to social-science proxies.
