The intelligence dimension of Kautilyan statecraft and its implications for the present

摘要

In this article, we examine the question whether a premodem Indian author, Kautilya, who addressed statecraft and intelligence in a scholarly fashion, might bear a meaning for contemporary Intelligence Studies. Kautilya, a near-contemporary of Aristotle and Alexander the Great, viewed intelligence as a central feature of statecraft. While not yet employing the category 'intelligence', the concept of intelligence is very much present in Kautilya's opus magnum Arthashastra, which can be translated as Textbook of Statecraft and Political Economy'. Kautilya provides a detailed account of intelligence collection, processing, consumption, and covert operations, as indispensable means for maintaining and expanding the security and power of the state. His understanding of intelligence analysis is outstanding, albeit mostly not explicitly elaborated. In the following, we explore Kautilya's doctrine of intelligence and statecraft, as well as its contemporary relevance, in a 'scale-model' approach, as to demonstrate the validity and meaningfulness of pursuing research on that subject on a broader scale, as well as with greater depth.