Chanakya (Kautilya) · Politics

The Science of Statecraft

Kautilya&rsquo;s <em>Arthashastra</em> - one of the world&rsquo;s first systematic treatises on government, economics, and war - and its radical claim that <em>artha</em> (material welfare and power) deserves a hard science of its own, the science of acquiring and maintaining the earth.

What you'll be able to recall

You learned that Kautilya&rsquo;s Arthashastra is a systematic science of artha (wealth and power), that he ranked the &lsquo;science of government&rsquo; ( dandaniti ) among the great sciences as the one on which worldly progress depends, and that the surviving text is likely a composite edited over centuries. Explai…

Leads to Aristotle.

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