Studying for AP World essay topics, and was wondering if you guys could help tell me how you’d score this essay.</p>
Question: Analyze the impact of the Mongol conquest into China.
1 Acceptable Thesis
2 Addresses all parts of the question
(1) addresses some parts of the question
2 Substantiates thesis w/ appropriate historical evidence
(1) partially substantiates
1 Uses global historical context effectively to explain change over time and/or continuity
1 Analyzes the process of change over time and/or continuity
Total Basic Points: 7</p>
2 Possible number of points earned for expanded core
Total possible Points: 9</p>
The decline of the Song Dynasty and increasing nomadic raids produced a weak and fractured China in the early-to-mid 13th century A.D. This decline of Chinese power would ultimately provide an opening for increased Mongol expansion and conquest on the Chinese frontier, leading to the establishment of a Mongol imperium in China under the Yuan Dynasty in 1271. The Mongol interlude in Chinese history in the 13th and 14th centuries would spark major economic, political and social change within Chinese civilization which provided increased prosperity and open relations between China and the world, yet ultimately led to large instabilities and cultural disarray upon the Mongol exit from China, providing context for the Chinese withdrawal from the global stage occurring in the 15th century.</p>
<pre><code> Economically, Mongol impact would provide greater trade and business for China, yet would not place significant need for continued trading relations between China and the rest of the world. Rule by the Mongols which stretched from China in the East to Russia and the Middle East in the West provided safer trading passages and routes, strengthening the Silk Road and bringing greater economic wealth along it. In addition, Mongol rulers elevated merchants from their traditional roles as mean or culturally low-ranking peoples, promoting more trade and wealth both to and from China. Indeed, this wealth spread to lower class Chinese as well, with the Mongol tax-burden significantly lower than the previous Song taxation. However, the Mongol rule failed to change exiting economic themes which had perpetuated the Chinese desire for isolation in the past. Far more economic goods were exported from China along the Silk Road, than received from it. In addition, Mongol rule continued to promote a rise in urbanization in China, producing significant cultural and technological advances which made permanent ties to the global trading network unneeded from a Chinese perspective. Also, as the Mongols respected peasant land ownership, preventing a significant economic crisis on parallel with Rome or contemporary Russia which would produce external economic needs. Indeed, as the Mongols exited China, this pattern would continue with the Chinese drawdown from major trading networks with the end to the Mongol control and stability of the Silk Road.
While the Mongols would help politically elevate China to a more open, stronger position than it had been before, continuing political themes of self-sufficiency and internal strife motivated increased Chinese reclusion following the Mongol exit. A large change between Chinese government before and during Mongol rule was the centralization of that government. Mongol rule eliminated the Civil Service which had traditionally held major power in Chinese government, marginalizing the scholar-gentry class and consolidating imperial power within China. In addition, the Mongol rule expanded Chinese political reach throughout the world, with the favorable court-writings of European traveler Marco Polo (promoted in large part by the Mongols) spread across Europe, promoting Chinese standing among the rest of the world. However, fundamental domestic issues would facilitate the Chinese tendency towards isolation. Even with the flow of foreign ideas through the Silk Road, the Mongol court accepted traditional Chinese philosophy, as evidenced by the fact that it was counseled in large part by Confucian and Daoist advisors. This lack of foreign philosophical connection would eliminate any significant need for the Chinese to continue political relations with the rest of the world after the decline of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. And though the Mongols established a large naval fleet which would provide context for later Chinese maritime expansion, internal strife would limit Chinese foreign expansion, in favor of drawing resources closer to home. Continued hostilities between the Mongols and the Chinese, as evidenced by the rebellions by Song-loyalists in southern China, and secret societies to overthrow Mongol rule, would also preoccupy the Chinese from significant international relations. Even after the fall of the Yuan Dynasty in 1368, the Chinese-led Ming Dynasty would continue to battle with nomadic tribes and other remnants of Mongol rule.
Mongol rule socially reversed centuries of Chinese tradition, leading towards significant social strife after Mongol rule, representing additional factors in the Chinese withdrawal from the global stage. A large piece to the Mongol social rule was the displacement of Chinese social structure in favor of a Mongol-imposed one which placed foreigners and minorities over the traditional Chinese. The Yuan court heavily utilized minority council, in particular Buddhist and Muslim interests. In addition, the significantly small minority of ethnic Mongols sat atop the Mongol China social pyramid, with Mongol allies, nomadic peoples, and Muslims immediately below them, placing Northern Chinese and ethnic Chinese (in the south) at the lower ends of the social hierarchy. In addition, a stronger Mongol emphasis on womens rights contrasted heavily to the traditional Chinese institutions. The disencouragement of the Chinese practice of foot-binding (or binding a womens feet to show female subservience) as well as the introduction of property rights for women played a significant role in the social reversal under Mongol rule. In addition, while Mongol changes added social tensions to China, patterns of continuity also added social tensions. The inability of the Mongols to suppress ethnic identities ultimately proved to be among the social factors that swept their rule, with the ethnic southern Chinese revolting after nearly a century of Mongol rule. Strong distinctions between Mongol and Chinese (such as the lack of intermarriage, relationship and equality) promoted a fierce anti-Mongol backlash in the wake of the Yuan Dynastys fall. As the Yuan Dynasty collapsed, Chinese interests became engulfed in the social strife created by Mongol rule, with resentment towards Mongols, the empowerment of minorities (such as Buddhists, Muslims and foreigners) over the Chinese and the displacement of patriarchal values playing significant roles in the disarray of post-Mongol rule which eliminated any Chinese desire for continued interaction or expansion on the global stage. Regardless, Mongol rule had failed to be able to culturally expand and absorb Vietnam and south-east Asia (Java in particular), as it had for centuries prior by the Chinese. Ultimately, these social stresses provided internal unrest which China would use as context for a return to isolation after Mongol rule.
The Mongols entered China in the early 13th century, sparking a series of conquests and expansion. Ultimately, though, the Mongol economic, political and social change which saw the rise of China as a formidable world participator under the Yuan Dynasty, would prove unhelpful or specifically detrimental in the continued presence of China on the global stages. Inevitably, Mongol rule would provide the context for Chinas isolation and withdrawal from the world during the 15th century.
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