Colonial economy and society

Question 1

Mercantilism

Answer 1

The child country (New Spain/New world) couldn’t create manufactured goods, they could only export raw materials to the mother country (Spain) and then the mother country would create the manufactured goods and sell them to other countries as well as to the child country

Question 2

Main guiding principles of mercantilism?

Answer 2

Wants gold sliver, and goods to the iberian peninsula. Since they selled the manufactured goods they gained the money earned from their cost and kept it for themselves

Question 3

Labor systems?

Answer 3

Encomienda: A encomendero earned a piece of land and who ever lived on it had to labor for their master

Repartimiento: The crown allowed certain colonists to recruit indigenous for forced labor

Question 4

Critics and changes to the encomienda system?

Answer 4

1. Bartolome de las Casas
2. Laws of Burgos (1513)
3. New Laws of Indies (1542)

Question 5

Colonial society

Answer 5

The casta system:
A social pyramid
On the bottom Native Indians and Black slaves,
On top of the bottom, Mestizos (European and native Indians) and Mulatos (European and Slave)
Second “best” creoles(Spanish born in the new world)
On top “best” peninsulares (born in spain)