Kautilya's Maxims
10
Consulting Ministers
(ArS 1/15:13-16, 18-21, 23-41)

Bharadvaja: Divulging confidential counsel is fatal to the security and well-being of the King and his officers. Hence he should deliberate alone about sensitive matters. Counselors have others they consult with, and these in turn still others, leading eventually to disclosure.

Visalaksha: There is no advantage in deliberating alone. The King's affairs include the known, the unknown, and the inferred. Finding out the unknown, adding to the known, resolving contradictions in what is known, and learning more about the imperfectly known, can only be done with the aid of ministers. Rather, he should consult those of mature intellect.

Followers of Parasara: This is how to get greater certainty from counsel, not how to make it secure. He should consult about a matter like the one he has in mind ("We did it this way," or "If this happened, what should be done?"). He should then apply their advice to the actual case. Thus advice can be had while still maintaining secrecy.

Pisuna: No. Counselors who are asked about a remote affair, whether it has taken place or not, will give their opinion casually or disclose it; that is the flaw. He should instead deliberate with those who are qualified for the specific undertaking. Consulting with these only, he achieves effectiveness in deliberation and also maintains secrecy.

Kautilya:  No; this is a situation with no fixed rule. He should in general take counsel with three or four, since if he confers with one only, he may not be able to reach a decision in difficult matters. Also, a single counselor is unchecked, and if he consults with two, he will be controlled by them if they agree and ruined by them if they disagree. With three or four, this is less likely to happen, though there is still great danger if it should happen. With more than three or four, it may be difficult to reach decisions or maintain security. As appropriate to the time, the place, and the matter under consideration, he may consult with one or two, or deliberate by himself, according to his and their special competence.

Here again, Kautilya takes a pragmatic and eclectic stance, combining what is workable in the imperfect theories of his predecessors. A judgement of appropriateness in context, rather than a rule mechanically applied, seems to be his hallmark in these matters. His sense of the dynamics of group decision-making agrees with that of modern masters such as Parkinson, for whom five people is the maximum effective committee (p34).

We have eliminated two interpolated slokas, 1/15:17 (after the Bharadvaja maxim) and 1/15:22 (after the Visalaksha maxim). The latter includes a seeming folk saying. It is the association of folk material and sloka form in this and other passages which inclines us to suspect all folk material as later embellishments of the text (see our notes to Maxim #7 and Maxim #8). For the concept "resolving contradictions," in an ethical context but still with judicial or perhaps anti-judicial overtones, see LY 12:10.

 

Kautilya's Maxims is Copyright © 2001- by E Bruce and A Taeko Brooks

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