HIST 11A Lecture Notes - Lecture 16: Wang Mang, Filial Piety, Artistic Merit
Document Summary
Men appointed to government determined by shi: evolution of the shi, originally designated the lowest rank of the zhou nobility, during the warring states, referred to men schooled in the art of government, becoming wandering statesmen. In the qin and the han dynasty, these government officials were chosen: transformed from a professional group into a dominant social group. Han civil service recruitment: recommendation system: nomination by local officials on the basis of, literary merit, objective determination, loophole shi families invest in their children and ensure their literary merit. Families of officials can self-perpetuate as political elite. Han education: existed purely for training future civil servants. Still possible to break into the class through success: confucian ministers come to dominate government, connected to the rise of shi as a dominant social group, ministers advocate a minimalist form of government. Wang mang: was the regent of the child-emperor, deposed the child-emperor and established his own xin dynasty.
