 Elite Strategies for Big Shocks: The Case of the Fall of the MingCarol Shiue and Wolfgang Keller No 19642, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research Abstract: This paper documents persistence in the power of elite families in Central China despite dynastic change. We study the impact of the fall of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) on couples and their descendants (treatment of people), and present evidence on the response of multi-generational family lines to a big shock. Local Ming elites suffered a decline in influence in the short run, but in the long-run their descendants recovered and tightened their grip on power in their role as the elites of the new Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). In contrast to the recovery of family lines, the fall of Ming had a more persistently negative impact on the regions that historically were most strongly negatively affected by the shock (treatment of regions). The paper suggests that the elite reversal is due to trauma caused by Ming destruction that shifted norms towards the most socially respectable career paths based on the civil service exam; these norms were, to a greater degree, intergenerationally transmitted in family lines that suffered more from the destruction in the fall of the Ming dynasty. Keywords: Institutions (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:19642 Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from Access Statistics for this paper More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX, UK. |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.