Diversity, Elites and Social Categories
Introduced| English | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Casta system/ˈkæstə ˈsɪstəm/ | A colonial Spanish American system of social classification based on ancestry and perceived racial mixture. |
Accommodation or suppression
- Many states, such as the Mughal and Ottoman empires, adopted practices to accommodate the ethnic and religious diversity of their subjects or to utilise the economic, political and military contributions of different ethnic or religious groups.
- In other cases, states suppressed diversity or limited certain groups' roles in society, politics or the economy.
- The CED gives both options in one breath, so the exam expects you to choose a case and say which.
Select all the options the CED gives states facing diversity.
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The exam expects you to choose a case and say which option it shows.
Two states, opposite decisions
- The CED's sharpest pairing: the expulsion of Jews from Spain and Portugal; the acceptance of Jews in the Ottoman Empire.
- Same population, same decade, opposite policies — which makes it a controlled comparison.
- Its other examples: restrictive policies against Han Chinese in Qing China, and the varying status of different classes of women within the Ottoman Empire.
The expulsion of Jews from Iberia beside their acceptance in the Ottoman Empire is useful because...
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Each state was calculating what diversity was worth to it.
New elites appeared
- Imperial conquests and widening global economic opportunities contributed to the formation of new political and economic elites, including in China with the transition to the Qing Dynasty and in the Americas with the rise of the Casta system 卡斯塔制.
- The Casta system ranked people by ancestry and assigned legal and economic position accordingly.
- So a new elite is not only a new group at the top — it is a new rule for who may be at the top.
Accommodation, suppression, or a new elite?
Sort each policy or development.
The ____ system ranked people by ancestry and assigned position accordingly.
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A new elite is a new rule for who may be at the top.
Existing elites fluctuated, not simply declined. The CED's verb is fluctuated — some nobles lost influence to a centralising crown, and others gained by attaching themselves to it. An answer describing a uniform decline of aristocracies has replaced the CED's word with a simpler one.
The CED says the power of existing elites...
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Some gained by attaching themselves to the crown.
Old elites went up and down
- The power of existing political and economic elites fluctuated as the elites confronted new challenges to their ability to affect the policies of the increasingly powerful monarchs and leaders.
- The CED's examples of existing elites: Ottoman timars, Russian boyars, European nobility.
- Fluctuated is the operative word — not simply declined, since some elites gained by attaching themselves to the crown.
Select all the existing elites the CED names.
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The Casta system is a new elite formation.
Maintained or changed
- The objective asks how social categories, roles and practices have been maintained or have changed.
- So every case needs a verdict: was this continuity or change, and for whom?
- The Casta system is new; the Ottoman timar is an old category under new pressure — different answers to the same question.
Jews expelled from Spain and Portugal are accepted in the Ottoman Empire, where their commercial skills are treated as a contribution to be utilised. Same people, same years, opposite policies — and each state was making a calculation about what diversity was worth to it, which is exactly the choice the CED sets out.
States either accommodated diversity or utilised different groups' contributions, or suppressed diversity and limited certain groups' roles. New elites formed — the Qing transition, the Casta system. Existing elites' power fluctuated — Ottoman timars, Russian boyars, European nobility — as monarchs grew stronger. Every case needs a verdict: maintained or changed?
Write from 1492 and two policies toward Jews
- In 1492 Spain ordered Jews to leave or convert.
- The Ottoman Empire admitted many of the exiles.
How did the two states differ?
Empires chose accommodation or suppression.
What happened to many Spanish Jews after 1492?
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The two governments made opposite choices.