AI Snips
Chapters
Transcript
Episode notes
Extraction Over Development Shaped Economy
- Spain prioritized silver extraction over broader economic development, limiting internal trade and infrastructure.
- Poor roads and geography kept New Spain economically localized until later reforms and railroads.
Haciendas And Debt Peonage Transformed Land
- Haciendas replaced encomiendas, creating absentee landlords and debt peonage that displaced communal land rights.
- Land ownership became the primary measure of wealth and a persistent source of rural conflict.
Casta System Codified Social Order
- Around 700,000 Spaniards (mostly men) settled, producing the casta system that ranked people by ancestry.
- Peninsulares and criollos dominated land, government, and church offices at the top of the hierarchy.