u/ProductWeak

I’m double majoring in political science and environmental studies (have genuine interest in sustainability). I’ve done 2 boutique investment bank/brokerage internships so far, both in an emerging Asian market. Technicals are pretty good although there’s always room for improvements. took calc 1 and 2 and econ classes as electives. cgpa is good.

Honestly not sure how competitive I actually am here. UofT isn’t really considered a target school for US/Canada IB (semi target at best) and my major isn’t stem, finance or econ. Can I still get in with networking and building on the internships I already have? Or is this genuinely an uphill battle I shouldn’t be spending this much time on? in other words look for other career opportunities.

Also curious if anyone else broke into IB with a non-finance/non-STEM background. what actually worked for you?

Thanks guys for your input!

There is a growing habit among some Kazakh nationalists of claiming Chinggis Khan, the Mongol Empire and even the title of “real Mongols,” while denying that Khalkhas are Mongols. Historically, that argument does not hold up.

1. Kazakhs did not exist as a distinct people during Chinggis Khan’s lifetime
Chinggis Khan died in 1227. A distinct Kazakh political identity emerged more than two centuries later, in the mid-15th century, when groups led by Kerei and Janibek broke away from Abu’l-Khayr’s confederation.
The ancestors of modern Kazakhs obviously existed before that, but they were not collectively known as Kazakhs. They included Kipchak and other Turkic populations, along with Mongol-origin groups that were later absorbed and Turkicized.
Calling Chinggis Khan Kazakh is therefore an anachronism. He belonged to the medieval Mongol world and founded the Mongol Empire. A people whose distinct identity emerged centuries after his death cannot retroactively claim him as one of their own.

2. The rulers were Mongol, but the population remained mainly Kipchak
This is the main distinction people keep ignoring.
The Jochid ruling house was Mongol in origin. Jochi was Chinggis Khan’s son, and his descendants ruled the Golden Horde. The state began through the Mongol conquest of the Kipchak steppe.
But the ordinary population did not suddenly become Mongol. Most of the people living across the western steppe remained Turkic, especially Kipchak. A relatively small Mongol ruling and military elite governed a much larger Turkic population.
Over time, it was the Mongol elite that became absorbed into the local Kipchak environment. They adopted Turkic languages, converted to Islam, married into local populations and gradually became Turkicized.
The historical sequence is clear:
The rulers were originally Mongol.
The majority of the population remained Kipchak.
The Mongol ruling elite later became Turkicized.
This does not make Chinggis Khan Kazakh. It means that a Mongol dynasty conquered and ruled a Turkic population before its descendants were gradually absorbed into that population.
The Golden Horde was Mongol in its founding dynasty, conquest and original political legitimacy, while becoming increasingly Turkic in language, population and culture.

3. Chinggisid descent does not make Chinggis Khan Kazakh
The Kazakh khans later claimed the right to rule through descent from Jochi. That gave the Kazakh Khanate real Chinggisid legitimacy.
But the ancestry of a ruling family is not the same as the identity of the entire population it ruled.
A Mongol dynasty governing Turkic subjects does not become originally Turkic simply because its descendants later adopted the language, religion and culture of the majority population.
The rulers were descended from Chinggis Khan. The ordinary Kipchak population was not therefore transformed into Mongols, and Chinggis Khan was not transformed into a Kazakh.
Later assimilation cannot rewrite the identity of the founders.

4. Kazakhs are not the only people connected to the Golden Horde
Kazakhs are only one of several peoples that inherited parts of the Jochid world. Uzbeks, Tatars, Nogais, Crimean Tatars and others also inherited parts of its political and cultural legacy.
If inheriting the Golden Horde makes Chinggis Khan Kazakh, then the same argument would make him Uzbek, Tatar, Nogai and Crimean at the same time.
The point is that several modern peoples inherited parts of a Mongol-founded state. That inheritance does not allow any one of them to change the founder’s identity.
Some Kazakh clans also preserve names connected to groups from the medieval Mongol world. That may show historical mixture, assimilation or political association. A Mongol-origin clan name by itself does not make an entire modern population Mongol, and it certainly does not make Chinggis Khan Kazakh.

5. Dzungaria was an Oirat Mongol homeland
Before the Qing conquest, Dzungaria was the centre of the Dzungar Khanate, an Oirat Mongol state. The Dzungars were western Mongols, and their state was one of the last major independent Mongol steppe empires.
The Dzungars fought long wars against Kazakh groups, but those wars do not erase the identity of the people who ruled and inhabited Dzungaria before their destruction.
In the 1750s, the Qing Empire destroyed the Dzungar state and devastated its population through military killing, disease, enslavement and displacement. Kazakh groups later entered parts of the former Dzungar territory after the original Oirat population had been largely removed.
Later settlement does not prove ancient ownership. Modern borders and present-day demographics cannot be used to rewrite the past and erase the Oirat Mongols who lived there before the Qing conquest.
Dzungaria did not become historically Kazakh simply because Kazakh groups moved into parts of it after the destruction of the Dzungars.

6. Khalkhas are unquestionably Mongols
The claim that Khalkhas are not Mongols and are simply a Manchu-Han mixed population is historically baseless.
Khalkhas are a major branch of the Mongol people. They speak a Mongolic language, preserved a Mongol identity, lived in the central Mongolian homeland and were ruled by Mongol princes descended from the post-imperial Mongol aristocracy.
Under the Qing, Outer Mongolia was not absorbed into ordinary Han Chinese provincial society. It was governed separately through Mongol leagues and banners, hereditary Mongol princes and the Lifanyuan.
Mongols occupied an important and often privileged place within the Qing imperial system as military allies and members of the broader banner order. The Qing also restricted permanent Han agricultural settlement in Outer Mongolia and attempted to protect Mongol pasturelands from large-scale Chinese colonization.
That does not mean there were no Chinese merchants, migrants or cases of intermarriage. But there was no mass Han demographic replacement of the Khalkha population.
Qing rule did not make Khalkhas cease to be Mongol, just as Russian rule did not make Kazakhs cease to be Kazakh.

7. The argument relies on a complete double standard
Some Kazakh nationalists argue that being ruled by Chinggisid Mongols makes Kazakhs the true heirs of Chinggis Khan.
At the same time, they argue that being ruled by the Qing makes Khalkhas no longer Mongol.
Those two claims directly contradict each other.
You cannot argue that Mongol rule made Turkic Kipchaks into the “real Mongols,” while also arguing that Manchu rule made Mongolic-speaking Khalkhas stop being Mongol.
Foreign rule does not automatically change the ethnicity of an entire population.

The facts are clear:
Chinggis Khan was Mongol.
The Mongol Empire was founded by Mongols.
The Jochid ruling dynasty was Mongol in origin.
The majority population of the western steppe remained Turkic and Kipchak.
The Mongol ruling elite later became Turkicized.
The Kazakh identity emerged centuries after Chinggis Khan.
The Dzungars were Oirat Mongols.
Khalkhas are Mongols.
Kazakhs have their own history and a real connection to the Jochid world. But that does not make Chinggis Khan Kazakh, turn the original Mongol rulers into Kipchaks, erase the Oirat history of Dzungaria or make Khalkhas fake Mongols.
Shared history does not mean ownership of someone else’s identity.