Tipología social de una oligarquía urbana: los regidores de Guadalajara en el siglo XVIII. ¿Elite nobiliaria o burguesía funcionarial?

Abstract

During the Spanish ancien regime, Castilian cities, above all those with the right to vote in the Cortes and the centres of military and fiscal provinces, were ruled by oligarchies and intermediate urban classes who regarded them as a private property in which those in authority rarely performed their legal office and instead considered them as a means of upward social mobility. The venality of local office placed them in a political elite in the urban environment, provided them with important positions, and authority over substantial local fiscal resources and royal income such as servicios, millones, cientos, and alcabalas. In addition, political power provided much-desired social prestige, which was commonly associated with the status of nobility. This article addresses the social and economic origin, the and expectations of upward social mobility, of eighteenth-century regidores in Guadalajara.