Kautilya's Arthashastra

Philosophy of Strategy

Medha Bisht

• Publisher: Routledge India
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781000627534
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Political Philosophy

This book examines in detail the strategic relevance of the Arthashastra. Attributed to the fourth century B.C., this classical treatise on state and statecraft rests at the intersection of political theory and international relations.

Adopting a hermeneutic approach, the book discusses certain homologies related to concepts such as power, order, and morality. Underlining the conceptual value of the Arthashastra and classical texts such as Hitopdesha and Pancatantra, this volume highlights the non-western perspectives related to diplomacy and statecraft. It shows how a comparative analysis of these texts reveals a continuity rather than a change in the styles, tactics, and political strategies. The book also showcases the value these ancient texts can bring to the study of contemporary international relations and political theory.

This volume will be of interest to students, scholars and teachers of political studies, Indian political thought, and philosophy, South Asian studies, political theory and international relations.

Part I
A text on philosophy and strategy

1 Introducing Arthashastra

Philosophy, concepts, practice

The interaction between philosophy, concepts and practice and its relevance to political questions becomes significant because it directs the investigator’s mind on what should be rather than what is. This is not only helpful in distinguishing right from wrong, good from bad, but also enables one to go beyond mere episodic narratives and descriptions, offering insights to a researcher on how to aspire for desirable outcomes and define the meaning of political. This juxtaposition between the, is and the ought has been considered elemental in defining the meaning of the political per se. Upinder Singh argues meaning of political in ancient India was inferred from texts like dandniti, arthashastra and nitishastra and was often cast on a political, moral and metaphysical canvas (Singh 2017:6). Significantly, the relevance of Arthashastra provides an exciting site to students of political theory and international relations to understand the nature of political. It offers insights not only on the desirable and feasible elements of politics but also emphasizes the implications that philosophical questions have for formulating concepts intertwined with thought and practice.

This chapter revisits concepts, techniques and approaches that Kautilya built upon from earlier traditions in order to reconcile the desirability and the feasibility of political and social phenomenon. What should be the essential pillars of state and statecraft and what constitutes them, are central questions that Kautilya sought to address in Arthashastra. While Kautilya’s Arthashastra has rarely been studied as a text in comparative political thought, its dialectical engagement with Hindu philosophical traditions on the nature of order and power qualifies it to be one. Arthashastra engages with the nature of state defining its central pillars as the seven elements (saptanga theory). How can the state augment power and maintain order in a fluid environment is a key question that the text poses. The task of a philosopher is to often point “out consistencies and inconsistencies of claims and thoughts from within the city or community by measuring the performance of the context against his own constitutive criteria” (Bessussi 2012:3). Kautilya’s Arthashastra engages with his predecessors on the subject and offers his own suggestion on the prospective excellences (outstanding features) of state and statecraft. This is reflective of the fact that Arthashastra as a text does engage with the normative. It not only attempted to reconcile philosophy with policy, but also gave meaning to concepts, which could potentially direct strategy. The method (technique) of dialectics offered by Arthashastra, which were reasoned-logical arguments (anvikshiki), thus sought to establish the truth of order and balance in political life. Reflective of a scientific temper, this logical reasoning for understanding objects of state and statecraft (ontology) was constituted by both material and ideational factors, thus engaging with dominant strands within the Hindu tradition. “A form of reasoning that works from observed phenomena to underlying principles and factors that give rise to those observed phenomena” (Jackson 2011:75) becomes an important entry point for understanding the ideational and material foundation of the political in Arthashastra. Thus, the capacity of the state as an important inference point for explaining its behaviour as well as its qualification as an inferior or a superior state through virtues and excellences become important questions for the intersection between values and strategy.

On the basis of this criterion and the value it brings to the discipline of international relations, this chapter revisits Kautilya’s Arthashastra. Kautilya can be considered an ‘exemplar’ (paradigm) of how a philosopher and a strategist understood, conceptualized and endowed meaning to the political phenomenon and understood social order of the times. Rather than a thought on extremes, it is a text that adopts moderation and suggests a fine balance between internal well-being and external security. The method adopted by Arthashastra is therefore not only constitutive of norms prevalent in Hindu thought and tradition but also offers insights towards an approach that exhibits elements of holism. This in many ways can be a critique to the “culture of positivism”, which emphasizes the exclusion of values (Hamati-Ataya 2011:261). In fact, it offers a perspective on how values were reconciled with systems thinking when conceptualizing the political and international.

Arthashastra: its origins, authenticity and debates

Arthashastra was brought back from antiquity as recently as in the early twentieth century. Many speculations have been offered regarding the sudden disappearance of Arthashastra as it is believed that the use of Arthashastra was restricted to a select section of elites who desired its extinction rather than survival. Aiyangar notes

In the age of belief in the supernatural, parts of Arthashastra like Book Fourteen, Book Thirteen, Chapter Three and Book Four, which deal with secret means, magic, spells and incantations (respectively) should have been regarded by kings as dangerous literature which should not pass into the hands of enemies and disaffected subjects. Kautilya’s inductive treatment of such topics as the overthrow of princes etc., should have made kings eager to prevent the popularisation of the Arthashastra. The tremendous prestige of Kautilya’s name would also have cast glamour on his treatise and generated even a fear of it.

(Mishra 1993:23)

It is most interesting that a text, which originated in the Gangetic plains of India, was found in South India. The intellectual activity around Arthashastra started in 1909, when Rudrapanta Shamasastry edited and published the text for the first time. It has been argued that, a priest in Tanjore district of the Tamil Nadu state of South India handed over two manuscripts to the Mysore Government Oriental Library in 1905. In 1915, the text was translated to English, and Shamasastry noted in the Preface that Kautilya lived and wrote the famous work of Arthashastra between 321 and 300 b.c. (Mishra 1993:19). This view has been corroborated by R.P. Kangle, who notes that a statement on the authorship in the first and the last chapter of the Arthashastra, which notes that the “shastra was composed by Kautilya” and that “it was composed by that person who in resentment rescued the earth from the Nanda king” (Kangle 1999:59). This chronological reference, according to Kangle eliminates any benefit of doubt apropos the historicity of Arthashastra.

However, not many scholars agree with this view, as historians, philologists, diplomats, anthropologists and political scientists have raised questions regarding the association of the text to the Mauryan period, with some even problematizing the very authenticity of the text per se. S.C. Mishra has organized the debates and positions of various contentious views on the authorship and authenticity of the text around five specific schools of thought – the German school, the Calcutta school, the Imperialist school, the Indian school and the Soviet school (Mishra 1993:21–35). While the rationale for the neat demarcation that Mishra makes is a bit misplaced, as there are overlapping arguments within and across schools, his work does offer a useful summary and a rich body of reference material for detailing the various contentious viewpoints regarding the identity of Arthashastra.

These schools are also instructive on the international interest that the text has generated amongst scholars. The broad arguments posited by scholars revolve around (a) the identity of the author and the text and (b) the broad periodization of Arthashastra. The first relates to the ownership of Arthashastra, i.e. whether it was written by an individual or was it a result of the contribution from different individuals, who belonged to the Kautilya School or was Kautilya a mythical character, with no existence in reality? The second relates to the temporality of Arthashastra, i.e. whether it was pre Mauryan or post Mauryan. The debate is relevant in terms of strategic thought which many scholars argue was non-existent in early India.

Identity of the author and the text

Authorship of Kautilya’s Arthashastra has been questioned by a group of scholars such as A.L. Basham, Romila Thapar, Alfred Hillebrant and Arthur Berriedale Keith who disagree on the periodization of Arthashastra. The text for instance has been traced to the pre-Gupta age on the grounds that it refers to people and places such as China, which were unfamiliar to people in the fourth century b.c. (Basham 1954:50). Thapar’s argument that Arthashastra could be an edited composition, compiled around third and fourth century AD, corroborates this view (Thapar 1993:32). Taking this argument further some have concluded that Arthashastra was a product of ‘Kautilya school’ and that Kautilya was a student of Arthashastra and not its composer (Hillebrant 1923 cited in Mishra 1993:22). On similar lines Julius Jolly has questioned the identity of Kautilya, considering him half historical or mythical (Jolly cited in Mishra 1993:20). However, Kalidas Nag has been of the view that Arthashastra was not a homogenous text and was recast several times on several occasions. He argued that “frequent copying of manuscripts was a common phenomenon in Indian culture, where the transcripts were subject to continuous revision” (Nag cited in Mishra 1993:25).

Some have considered Arthashastra as a nationalist project, which was revisited during the Indian National Movement. Belongingness to an ancient past, which reconciled tradition with modernity, renders Arthashastra as a political project, which was foregrounded in the Kautilyan moment and in the making of modern India (Menon 2014; Vajpayee 2016). Jolly has questioned the claims on authenticity of text by highlighting the anticolonial environment, where the swarajists were politically motivated to save interest in the intellectual legacy of ancient India. “History and politics as he argued, had to be kept separate from each other. It was the interaction between these two that Arthashastra was essentialised and established as the legend of Kautilya” (Jolly cited in Mishra 1993:21).

In order to explore the homogeneity and plurality of Arthashastra, some scholars adopted a statistical and temporal analysis to argue that the author’s style in Arthashastra changes as he grows older and more experienced. Trauttman argues, that “there were three hands which are discernible in Arthashastra. One responsible for Book Two dealing with internal administration of the kingdom, one responsible for Book Three, a kind of Dharmasmriti dealing with law, and the third responsible for Book Seven, considering the struggle for power between states” (Trauttman cited in Mishra 1993:34). Grigoriĭ Maksimovich Bongard-Levin is of the same view, as he notes that the “text was gradually written in the pre-Mauryan, the Mauryan and post-Mauryan age, as the details in the text are relevant to all ages. He argues that there could be a possibility of the text being composed of several independent treatises” (Levin cited in Mishra 1993:36). These debates offer an interesting insight and can be reconciled by understanding the philosophy of strategy, which Kautilyan tradition highlights with regards to secular/political affairs.

Periodisation of Arthashastra

The periodization of Arthashastra has been speculated to have ranged from sixth century b.c. to seventh century A.D. For instance, in 1914–15 Julius Jolly came up with a collection of parallel passages on Arthashastra and Dharmashastra. In one of the papers in the collection, he cited a passage from Dasakumaracarita, which claimed that Arthashastra was abridged by Vishnugupta into 6000 verses for the use of Mauryas. Jolly considered Arthashastra not to be older than Dasakumaracharita which was written around the seventh century A.D. Jolly’s main contention was that “alchemy, metallurgy and surunga were used no later than third century” and hence justified his dating of Arthashastra (Jolly cited in Mishra 1993:20). Keith supported this view and argued that the text would have been written around the seventh century A.D. by a court official in South India (Keith cited in Mishra 1993:23). Supporting this hypothesis was also a well-known Indian scholar, Ramkrishna Gopal Bhandarkar, who assumed the date of Arthashastra to be between first and second century A.D. He traced his rationale to Vatsyayana’s Kamasutra, whose author was the earliest to notice it (Bhandarkar cited in Mishra 1993:23).

On the contrary, Thomas and Monahan have traced Arthashastra to be a product of the fifth and fourth century b.c. as according to Thomas, it was during this period that a subject of “royal policy was a recognised topic” (Thomas cited in Mishra 1993:22). Monahan argued that Arthashastra was the basis of Mauryan institutions as the polity described in the treatise was that of a small state (Monahan cited in Mishra 1993:22). Kalidas Nag supported the view, and argued that diplomacy in Arthashastra “was not that of a centralised empire but rather of a divided family, in which each chief is in constant conflict with his equals for hegemony, which in its turn crumbles down by causing a new series of war” (Nag cited in Mishra 1993:25). This he argued was contrary to the politics of large empire, and therefore the text, according to him must have preceded the Mauryan empire.

However, tracing the roots of Arthashastra post-date Mauryan period, Devdatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar, notes that “Arthashastra must have been authored around seventh and second century BC” (Bhandarkar cited in Mishra 1993:24). Finding similarities between Dharmasutras and the Arthashastra, Bhandarkar argued that while the work was composed by Kautilya; the first and last chapter of the text must have undergone some modification or amplification shortly before Kamandaka 500 A.D. (Bhandarkar cited in Mishra 1993:26). Buddha Prakash, considering the rich historical events mentioned in Patanjali and similarities with Archae-median empire, concludes that portions of the text, specially portions discussing slavery, would have been written during the Mauryan period. The text according to him can be pushed to second century B.C., when India had familiarity with Nepal, Malaya Peninsula and China (Prakash cited in Mishra 1993:30). Another scholar Hemchandra Raychoudhury pushes the date further from 300 A.D. to 150 A.D., arguing that, “Asoka’s ignorance of Kautilya’s Arthashastra, his use of Prakrit as against the prescription of Sanskrit in Kautilya, his scribes familiarity with only forty-one letters as against sixty-three of Kautilya, the use of wood against bricks and the later and wider geographical horizon of Kautilya” makes it go against traditional dating (Raychoudhury cited in Mishra 1993:30). Charles Driekmeir on the other hand notes that Arthashastra includes revisions by several other writers, and Kautilya could belong to a period as late as the fourth century A.D., rather than the minister of Chandragupta. He argued that, “whoever composed the text on statecraft had an extensive knowledge of the Maurya administrative and diplomatic procedures” (Driekmeir cited in Mishra 1993:32).

While a categorical conclusion on the authorship and periodization could be a difficult task (Mishra 1993:36), as there is little consensus on the dating and authorship of Kautilya, the text does not lose its intellectual value. Given that Arthashastra was a piece of classical work in terms of raising important, eternal questions associated with the organization of state and statecraft, claims and debates on its historicity cannot be a limitation in drawing lessons and analytical value to the discipline of and debates in international relations. Kautilya’s Arthashastra could have been authored by a single individual or a school of scholars belonging to the Kautilya School, what is important is to note a continuous pattern in terms of the interdependence and causality of variables (constituent elements) that have been established between the internal and external realm. It indeed reflects a pattern of strategic thinking which sought to give meaning to the complexity of desirable (ought) and feasible (is) elements associated with state and statecraft.

The purpose of this book is therefore not to undertake a historical investigation; neither does it claim to add value to the understanding of the text, in terms of philological expertise. However, what it intends to do is to highlight its relevanc...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface and Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• PART I A text on philosophy and strategy
• PART II Exploring the feasible and desirable in Arthashastra
• PART III Learnings from Arthashastra: reflections on philosophy, statecraft and theory
• Bibliography
• Index