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Chapter 5

Society & Inequality in Eurasia / North Africa 500 B.C.E - 500 C.E.
-Chinese societies were founded more on state actions then by culture believes.
  1. Highest position in the hierarchy was taken by elite of officials, government power
  • Han emperor created a formal school to study Confucius to prepare for government service, this became the main learning process in China for over years.
  • To enter the civil service they had to pass a really difficult exam on the Confucius classics. Any male no matter what your social status was was allowed to take the exam. But the wealthier people were more likely to pass the exam because they had the resources and the time to study were as a person who comes from poverty had less time and resources to study mainly because they had to work to survive.
  • If the person passes the test their social status would move up, they would be praised mainly by their hometown. They would be seen as sophisticated afterwards.
Wealthy landlords would buy peasants land and make an army of their own to go against the government of the states.  The state mostly failed to stop these land owners.



I thought it was super interesting reading about how people mainly boys had to take an intelligence test in order to move up ranks. I think its crazy how much time these people would spend just studying for these test that would determine where in life and social status they fall in. Many of the wealthier people would succeed in the test because they were able to pay for tutors and were able to take free time to study whereas people who were not wealthy they did not have the time to study because they had to work to pay for food and other stuff and also they were not able to pay for tutors to guide their studies in order for them to do good.

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