The ‘Indian Civilizational’ Underpinnings to the Study of Political Science

Abstract

The study of Political Science as a discipline, like most other Social Sciences, tends to trace its history to the Greek civilizational period, right from the word ‘Politics’ derived from the Greek word-POLITIKA, from Aristotle’s classic work-POLITICS. Similarly, most of the concepts and theories in Political Science are also theorized by the Western scholars. However, politics is a fundamental activity which seeks to regulate the complex of relations among people living in a society. Thus, like there was a Greek thought, Chinese thought, there was a very mature Indian political tradition that can be traced to the Vedas and through the Epics of Ramayana (Book 2), Mahabharata- Shanti Parva (Book 12) and Kautilya’s Arthashastra. These treatises obviously reflect the political, social, cultural conditions of ancient India however; they do provide a rich intellectual background to our understanding of many basic concepts, ideas, and theories in Political Science. It is important for us to revisit these Texts and bring forth to the new generation and the World, at large, the scholarly insights of the Indian Knowledge System in the teaching learning of Political Science.