On May 17, 2016, General Secretary Xi Jinping presided over a symposium on philosophy and social sciences and delivered an important speech, proposing that efforts be made to build philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics, fully reflecting Chinese characteristics, Chinese style and Chinese style in the guiding ideology, discipline system, academic system and discourse system. On 25 April 2022, during a visit to Renmin University of China, General Secretary Xi Jinping stressed that accelerating the construction of philosophical and social sciences with Chinese characteristics boils down to constructing an autonomous Chinese knowledge system.
To further study and implement the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speech and promote the construction of an economics system with Chinese characteristics, on May 17, 2022, Management World organized a seminar on "Accelerating the Construction of an Economics System with Chinese Characteristics" (Opinions).
Professor Yang Canming, President of ZUEL and Director of the IIDPF, published an article entitled Accelerating the Construction of a Disciplinary System of Finance with Chinese Characteristics, the full article is as follows:
Accelerating the Construction of a Disciplinary System of Finance with Chinese Characteristics
Yang Canming
ZUEL, IIDPF
With the 100th anniversary of the birth of the Communist Party of China, more than 70 years of the founding of New China, more than 40 years of reform and opening up, and 10 years of economic and social practice into the new era of building socialism with Chinese characteristics, China has made brilliant achievements, accumulated a lot of experience, and finally formed a Chinese discourse, proposed a Chinese solution, summarized the Chinese model, and formed Xi Jinping's economic thought on socialism with Chinese characteristics in the new era, which is the realistic background and theoretical basis for building an economic system with Chinese characteristics. Understanding and handling the relationship between government and market, equity and efficiency is the core issue of the economics system with Chinese characteristics. Finance is an important link between government and market, fairness and efficiency, and Chinese finance is a core component of economics with Chinese characteristics. The formation of the discipline of finance with Chinese characteristics is an important part of accelerating the construction of an economics system with Chinese characteristics. To this end, I will elaborate on the significance and main tasks of building a finance with Chinese characteristics from four dimensions of important missions, and thus contribute to the promotion of the construction of an economics system with Chinese characteristics.
( I ) Historical dimension: Drawing on the strength of the financial spirit in the past and the future
Thousands of years of unbroken Chinese civilisation are closely related to finance. One of the missions of building a science of finance with Chinese characteristics is to revive historical memory, to sort out China's fiscal practices over thousands of years, the changes in the fiscal system and the role of finance in the overall national governance, to guide China's fiscal practices in the new era and to build the foundation and important pillars of national governance. Before the 1920s, though China did not have a theoretical system for the discipline of finance in the sense of public education, including teaching materials, after thousands of years of financial practice, a large number of financial thinkers emerged, represented by Shang Yang and Wang Anshi, which produced a wealth of financial ideas and theoretical doctrines and formed a vast historical literature. This is a valuable historical treasure for the Chinese people, and even more so for the people of the world. Between the 1920s and the founding of the PRC, when China experienced the domestic revolutionary war, the war of resistance against Japan and the war of liberation, Chinese finance was mainly based on the introduction of the British and American systems of finance. However, the Anglo-American system of finance was based on the capitalist system, whereas the pre-Liberation China was not simply capitalist but semi-colonial and semi-feudal in its relations of production, and therefore the theories of Anglo-American finance were not compatible with the social practices of China at that time. Between the founding of the PRC and 2012, China has gone through different stages of development, including socialist revolution and construction, reform and opening up, while Chinese finance has undergone historical changes of being introduced from Britain and the US, then from the Soviet Union, and then from Britain and the US again. At the same time, Chinese finance began to emerge as an autonomous and independent academic idea and academic philosophy, but a Chinese finance discipline system that is compatible with Chinese history, politics, institutional culture and economy and society has not yet been constructed. As we enter a new era of socialism, we need to build a disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics. It is therefore necessary to recapture history, continue to build on the past, find the original roots of China's financial development, awaken the ancient memory of China's financial reform and development, form a disciplinary system appropriate to China's development path and China's economic practice, and provide theoretical support and guidance for China's financial practice.
( II) Spatial dimension: A global perspective to advance the process of human civilization
Traditional finance, with its national or regional scope of study, is unable to respond to the new issues facing human development in the wave of globalisation. The fiscal practice and theoretical issues discussed in the disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics in the new era cannot be limited to China alone, but must also take into account the goals of participating in global governance and building a community of human destiny. Therefore, in terms of the spatial dimension, the construction of the discipline of finance with Chinese characteristics should uphold the concept of great nation finance, provide a guarantee and support for China's participation in global governance, and have a standpoint of the community of human destiny. This is also related to the aims of the Chinese Communist Party, which, since its birth, has not only focused on a particular country, but founded the Communist International, including the First, Second and Third Internationals. United Proletarians of the World has been the most resounding slogan of the Communist Party since its inception. Thus, the community of human destiny advocated by the Chinese Communist Party is rooted in the tenets and ideals demonstrated in the Communist Manifesto. As a responsible power, China has the mission of a great nation and the global obligations it should fulfil. In terms of academic research, the discipline of finance with Chinese characteristics needs to expand its spatial scope and integrate global public goods, global inequality, global taxation, international tax competition and cooperation into its research framework, and fully consider global governance issues. In terms of fiscal practice, the discipline of finance with Chinese characteristics needs to develop systematic theories and effective policy guidelines in the areas of global public goods financing, global financial cooperation and fiscal risk management.
( III) Value dimension: Building the people's treasury with a strong sense of originality
Although finances have played an important role in China's history over the past few thousand years, they have been used mainly to safeguard the rule and interests of the slave-owning and feudal landowning classes over the past few thousand years. During the Republic of China before liberation, on the other hand, the treasury mainly served the interests of the feudal buyers and bureaucratic capital. Since the establishment of the People's Republic of China and the choice of the socialist road, the Communist Party of China, which founded the People' s Republic of China, has always upheld the concept of "people first" and "people-centred", and the finances of the new China are the people's finances, serving to realise people's aspirations for a better life. It is a finance that serves the people's aspirations for a better life. The evolution of finance is a reflection of the original intention and mission of the Chinese Communists. From the contradiction between the people's growing material and cultural needs and backward social production to the contradiction between the people's growing needs for a better life and unbalanced and insufficient development, the finance of the new China has always been centred on the people, working for the happiness of the Chinese people and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. The people's finance is a direct manifestation of the people's status as the main body in historical development in the practice of finance, highlighting the people's subjectivity of finance. It is also a fundamental principle that finance with Chinese characteristics must always adhere to when standing at the new starting point of building a moderately prosperous society and embarking on a new journey to promote common prosperity. Looking to the future, Chinese finance must consciously incorporate the Party's policies into the construction of the discipline, adhere to the "people-centred" development ideology, focus on solving the problem of unbalanced and insufficient development, continuously improve the disciplinary system, raise the level of theory, strengthen the connection with reality, enhance the effectiveness of guidance, and better play the role of finance as the foundation and important pillar of national governance. This will enable us to better fulfil our role as a fundamental and important pillar of national governance and better meet the growing needs of the people in the economic, political, cultural, social and ecological spheres.
( IV) Goal dimension: Talent training to achieve the great rejuvenation of the Chinese people
General Secretary Xi Jinping stated, "The hopes of the Party and the country rest on the youth!" A discipline needs to accumulate knowledge and improve its theoretical system, but another important mission is to disseminate knowledge and train professionals to contribute to sustainable economic and social development. China has gradually become a semi-colonial and semi-feudal society since the Opium War in 1840. The country has been humiliated, the people have suffered, and civilization has been left in the dust. On the new journey of realising the Chinese dream of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, the discipline of finance with Chinese characteristics needs not only to build a theoretical, academic and disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics, but also to fully dovetail with the goals that need to be achieved by 2035, the goals that need to be achieved by 2050 and longer-term goals, and to guide how finance can fulfil its mission as the foundation and important pillar of national governance The goal is to achieve the ultimate goal of communism. Achieving these goals will depend on the continued growth and renewal of the financial talent pool. Therefore, finance with Chinese characteristics also bears the difficult and important task of cultivating talents. In the process of cultivating talents in Chinese finance, we must adhere to the concept of nurturing people for the Party. In the historical relay race of realising the Chinese dream, we will nurture a group of fiscal researchers and practical fiscal workers who will strive to be the first on the track of achieving the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, and nurture generations of reliable builders and qualified successors of socialism with Chinese characteristics.
To sum up, taking Marxist thought as the guide, absorbing and drawing on the reasonable components of Western finance, and fully integrating it with China's national conditions to form a disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics in the new era is an important task for contemporary finance researchers and practical finance workers. The disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics in the new era should have a longer-term historical perspective, review and summarise the history of finance before the founding of the PRC, and fully absorb the theories of state distribution, public finance and state governance developed after the founding of the PRC, so as to form a theoretical and academic system that is logically coherent and appropriate to China's development path, its economic system and its financial practices. The disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics in the new era needs to have a broader spatial scope. China is a responsible power, and in the context of the community of human destiny, the construction of great power finance needs to break through the geographical limitations of traditional finance, and provide a guarantee and support for China's participation in global governance. The disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics in the new era needs to have a more noble value orientation, and the people's ownership is the foundation of socialism with Chinese characteristics. In contrast to the bourgeois finance discipline in the UK and the US, the basis of the construction of the finance discipline in China is the people and its purpose is to serve the people. The disciplinary system of finance with Chinese characteristics in the new era needs to have a more ambitious goal. We need to help build an outstanding team of talents in fiscal research and fiscal practice, and contribute to the realization of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, the greatest dream of the Chinese nation in modern times.