Need for Kautilyan Science Diplomacy

Science diplomacy is a vital foreign policy tool, and India has to look no further than Arthashastra for wisdom.

Kautilya’s tenets from the Arthashastra have been a huge influence on India’s statecraft for more than two millennia. Arthashastra’s doctrine on the responsibility of the highest office, on conservation and utility of natural resources, on social fabric, on excises and regulations, on judiciary, and on spying and warfare are relevant even today. Kautilya’s maxim is revered in textbooks, in boardrooms, as well as on the battlefield. However, very few attempts have been made to apply it in highly-specialised domains of statecraft, one being science diplomacy.

Modern science is a multi-focal, trans-disciplinary and cutting-edge industrial activity. It churns discoveries, inventions, and innovations on an incessant conveyor belt, promotes people-to-people collaborations, is the precursor of economic progress, and a springboard to elevate a nation in the hierarchy of the global power structure. Consequently, science diplomacy has become a vital foreign policy tool for attaining both national soft- and hard-power aspirations.

India is a new state but an ancient civilization. So, it is advantageously placed to use its civilizational wisdom and knowledge to shape negotiations and craft strategies that advance the modern Indian state’s aspirations. And when it comes to realizing aspirations, the tenet of Arthashastra can become the foundation of India’s science diplomacy.

One of the most prominent concepts of Arthashastra is Rajamandala, which refers to the six different policies (guna) that a government (raj) should maintain so as to maintain its geospatial sphere (mandala) of influence and defend its interests.

Science diplomacy can be stimulated to foster people-to-people (scientist-to-scientist) interactions and generate trust-binding relations when the government undertakes a sandhi (peace) guna-based foreign policy. Sandhi happens when countries exchange scholars, train them, maintain bilateral grant schemes, identify areas of common scientific interests, and make small yet premeditated investments in each other’s scientific infrastructure.

A government undertaking the guna of vigraha (hostility) engages in a posturing, signaling and intimidating science diplomacy by flaunting high-end militarized scientific and technological capabilities. Vigraha is expressed by only those governments that have the ability to develop state-of-the-art technologies with applications that can overwhelm and overawe the counterpart it is aimed at.

A calculated and controlled science diplomacy, by opening limited areas for bilateral, unpromising and low-risk collaborative interaction, can be initiated by a government if it wants to undertake a foreign policy based on dvaidbhavana (blend of vigraha and sandhi). This diplomacy is undertaken only when a government intends to break ice with its counterpart or attempt one final détente before the relationship takes a downturn.

A government that undertakes science diplomacy with a yana (expeditionary) guna forms partnerships with a friendly government and co-invests with them in a high-risk-high-reward project. Yana is practiced only with those governments with whom the pursuant shares the strongest relations and the two are clear about maintaining strong and mutually-beneficial associations in the future.

And when a government intends to offer a certain resource available in their country for strategic-scientific goals of another government in exchange of protection and security, it can be said to be engaging in the science diplomacy of sanshraya (asylum). Sanshraya is pursued in scenarios when a government is technologically immature, has lack of scientific and human resources, or has not pursued the domain in which it intends to barter with the superior counterpart.

The six guna of Rajamandala have been pursued, knowingly and unknowingly, in various domain of science diplomacy by the Indian government over the past 70 years. When India goes to outer space with friendly countries it follows the yana guna; when it demonstrates a successful missile or nuclear test, it undertakes the guna of vigraha; when it attempts to break ice with a hostile nation it undertakes dvaidbhavana; when it seeks a high-technology from a capable nation, it undertakes the guna of sanshraya.

Apart from these gunas, the four Upayas — Sama, Daam, Bheda, Danda — of the Arthashastra can also be pivotal methodologies of science diplomacy, each undertaken to suit unique strategic necessities and provisos.

Sama in science diplomacy is undertaken when a government actively facilitates exchange of scientific scholars, scholarly research and analyses, and technical and monetary resources that help in sustenance of bilateral and multilateral scientific and technical relationships. This approach to science diplomacy implies regularity and normalcy of bilateral and multilateral relations.

Daam in science diplomacy happens when the partner governments decide to reap benefits from scientific ventures either via governmental, not-for-profit or for-profit modes. The benefits can range from monetary dividends, a new scientific or technological output, a joint venture, or even a long-lasting profiting asset.

Both Sama and Daam constitute the constructive arm of diplomacy, however that is not it.

Bheda comes to science diplomacy when a government sets patrols, establishes alarms, and penalizes foreign entities that are deliberately or inadvertently causing damage to the scientific infrastructure or resources of the nation. Bheda can be pre-emptive or a retaliatory strike via economic or technology sanctions. It is, however, a step below punitive destructive action.

Science diplomacy with attributes of Danda is witnessed when a government utilizes high-end deep-science and high-technology resources or capabilities to overtly or covertly apply destructive punitive action against an adversary. It can amount to disruption of the adversary’s supply chains that upkeep its scientific R&D activities, compromise the latter’s human resource, deny them basic utilities, elicit disruption of financial resources, and aid and abet war.

With Rajamandala and Upayas, it is clear that science diplomacy, from the vantage point of Arthashastra, has numerous overtones. Yet, in the absence of Kautilya-niti, science diplomacy tends to be limited within the soft-power realms of Sama and Daam, only because these are recurring peacetime pursuits.

Science diplomacy is also tuned, but seldom acknowledged, for Bheda and Danda or for hard power gains during shorter-periods of intense conflicts. Science diplomacy for hard power gains requires the technocrats to possess hawkish attitude, an acumen of a business leader in an unsympathetic market, and the temperament of a commanding warrior in a harsh battlefield. Where soft-power science diplomacy is accommodating and agreeable, hard-power science diplomacy demands highest level of vigil and preparedness to secure and advance national interests.

The Indian civilization’s antiquity has been testimony to numerous diplomatic successes and failures, each having had far-reaching effects on our history. Our antiquity is full of vital lessons but only if we learn from them and unlearn the past errors.

The modern parlance of science diplomacy is largely shaped by the 20th century developed ‘Western’ world. This parlance has been embedded due to their strategic dominance over the modern global economy, their huge scientific advancements, and control over narrative-making. But India need not entirely depend on this 20th century ‘developed world parlance’ as it will restrict its science diplomacy to remain conducive, accommodating, and submissive.

The essence of realpolitik demands India to have a holistic and native approach to science diplomacy. India needs to comprehend with whom, when and how friendly, defensive, combative and ruthless it needs to be to pursue its science diplomacy. This multiprong approach can only come if science diplomacy is moored in realism and there is no better teacher of realpolitik than Kautilya. Arthashastra has pertinent applications to the specialized domains of diplomacy and statecraft. It can be a sentinel for India’s self-realized science diplomacy.

This blog was published in the October 2020 edition of Science India magazine published by Vijnana Bharati.