How did the Han Dynasty govern/organize/run China and it's Empire?
I. How the Han Dynasty began....
1. Bureaucracy
A. The Emperor needed a bureaucracy to help him rule
A. The peasants owed a a month's worth of labor or military service to the government- filled ranks of army
B. When Wudi was emperor, he expanded the empire through war
A. The Silk Roads
I. How the Han Dynasty began....
- Liu Bang won a civil war against Xiang Yu and named himself the first emperor of the Han Dynasty- the Former Han and the Later Han.
- He created a centralized governement, lowered taxes, and made the harsh punishments not so harsh.
- When Liu Bang became emperor he established a centralized government
- In a centralized government a central authority controls the ruling of the state.
- This meant that all of the provincials had to report to Liu Bang's central government.
- The people in the central government were called commanderies.
1. Bureaucracy
A. The Emperor needed a bureaucracy to help him rule
- To raise money the government issued taxes
- In the bureaucracy there were 18 different ranks of civil service jobs
- The emperor Wudi, who was Liu Bang's great grand-son set up civil service jobs because it would help him rule.
- Civil service is when the civilians can obtain government jobs when they take certain examinations/tests.
- These tests included topics history, law, literature, and Confucianism.
- Only the sons of wealthy landowners could do civil service because peasants did not have enough money to educate their sons by sending them to a school.
A. The peasants owed a a month's worth of labor or military service to the government- filled ranks of army
B. When Wudi was emperor, he expanded the empire through war
- he defeated the troublesome Xiongnu and colonized areas such as Korea and Manchuria
A. The Silk Roads
- The trade routes/caravan trails used to trade silk and other goods were called the silk roads.
- The silk went from China to the West.
- government ran silk mills competing with other silk weavers for making silk
- A monopoly happens when a group has absolute authority over the production and distribution of particular goods.
- In China, the government established monopolies on the mining of salt, the making/forging of iron, the minting of coins, and the fermentation of alcohol.