In contrast with Ashoka's focus on human behaviour, Kautilya, who was the principal adviser to Ashoka's grandfather Chandragupta (the Mauryan emperor who established the dynasty and was the first king to rule over nearly all of India) and author of the celebrated fourth-century BC treatise Arthasastra (broadly translatable as 'Polit¬ical Economy'), put his emphasis on building up and making use of social institutions. Kautilya's political economy was based on his understanding of the role of institutions both in successful politics and in efficient economic performance, and he saw institutional fea¬tures, including restrictions and prohibitions, as major contributors to good conduct and necessary restraints on behavioural licence. This is clearly a no-nonsense institutional view of advancing justice, and very little concession was made by Kautilya to people's capacity for doing good things voluntarily without being led there by well-devised material incentives and, when needed, restraint and punishment, Many economists today do, of course, share Kautilya's view of a venal humanity, but these views contrast sharply with Ashoka's optimistic belief in making people behave dramatically better by persuading them to reflect more, and by encouraging them to understand that dumb thought tends to yield coarse behaviour, with terrible conse¬quences for all.