The Spanish maintained a powerful and vast empire for a long period of time. The Spanish Empire was interesting and it was fascinating the way that they expanded the empire before its collapse. One of the most interesting things about the empire was how the Spanish interacted with the native people of the land during and after they were conquered. .
This paper will focus mainly on the community and social relationships within the empire. Some other topics of discussion will include issues associated with inter-community interaction, treatment of outsiders and enemies, the nature of war and expansion within the empire. .
The Spanish had a social hierarchy to sort of rank its people. At the top of this hierarchy were the penisulares. The peninsulares were those born in old Spain. People born in New Spain were called Criolles. Criolles were usually not considered as loyal as those born in old Spain and therefore were not trusted as much. Third in this order were the Mestizos. Mestizos had a percentage of Spanish blood. There was a system in place to determine how much a person had. One could purchase what was called "Certificates of Whiteness". Basically, if you had enough money you could make yourself Spanish in the eyes of the government. This goes to show how greedy the Spanish were. Next in the social order were the Indians. Indians were treated as perpetual minors and thus did not have the rights or privileges of the Spanish people. Last in the social order of people were the Castas. These were African slaves. There were very few slaves in Spain and thus most work was done without slave labor. .
Once the Spanish expanded their empire to what they called "New Spain", new problems arose. What did they do with the Indians? It seems as though they never really decided what to do with them. The Spanish finally decided on an approach. In theory they were supposed to do two things for the Indians: 1. They were supposed to introduce Christianity to them.