On the afternoon of March 17, the 11th Symposium of the "Workshop on Political Economy of Four Universities and One Institute" was held at Tsinghua University. The participants studied the spirit of China's "two sessions" and had an in-depth discussion, with a focus on new quality productive forces. The symposium was organized by the School of Marxism, the Institute for State-owned Enterprises, the Institute of Economics and the Center for Digital Economy of the School of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University. Present were more than 20 experts and scholars from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Tsinghua University, Peking University, Renmin University of China, Nankai University, Fudan University, and China Agricultural University. The symposium was presided over by Prof. Liu Zhen from the School of Marxism, Tsinghua University.
Through the prism of Marxist political economy, developing new quality productive forces is of great significance to Chinese modernization, said Prof. Qiu Haiping from Renmin University of China at the symposium. The tasks of academics is to return to theoretical research in various areas, and explain the transformation and development of society by beginning with the process of historical development and gaining insight from the concept.
Prof. Zhou Wen from Fudan University said that there was great room for research on how to make studies on new quality productive forces more theoretical, systematic and academic. Prof. Zhang Xu from the Institute of Economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences argued that developing new quality productive forces was a practical, theoretical and directional issue, and scholars of political economy should further think about this issue from the perspective of regularity and conduct theoretical research by starting with the labor process. Prof. Fang Min from Peking University noted that productive forces was a concept of political economy, and it was necessary to systematically study how to create a synergy between new quality productive forces and new productive relations, and at the same time pay attention to the identification and characterization of new quality productive forces.
Prof. Zhang Hui from Peking University analyzed new quality productive forces based on the theory of total factor productivity, starting from revolutionary technological breakthroughs and returning to the origin of productive forces. From the perspective of innovation and innovation policies, Associate Professor Feng Kaidong from Peking University analyzed the two contexts of new quality productive forces, namely the transformation of international political and economic relations, and the transition from manufacturing-based economy to innovation-based economy.
Prof. Zhao Feng from Renmin University of China said that new quality productive forces were not only about producing use value, but involved value growth. Based on the role of economic thoughts in promoting the innovative development of historical materialism, Researcher Guo Guanqing from the Institute of Economics of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences explored origin-tracing studies, with a focus on innovation brought about by the theory of new quality productive forces in the core realm of the productivity theory. Starting from the connotation of industries, Prof. Wang Yong from Tsinghua University proposed future academic discussions from an economic perspective, taking into account the current discussions in various industries, with focus on the computing power industry in the digital economy. Liu Zhen believed that studies on new quality productive forces should further unfold theoretically and academically, and probe into the relationship between new quality productive forces and the problem of unbalanced development from the perspective of coordinated regional development.
Prof. Wang Shengsheng from Nankai University, Assistant Professor Tang Qi from Peking University Health Science Center, Prof. Wang Na from China Agricultural University, Associate Professor Shen Youjia from Renmin University of China, Associate Professor Zhao Zhun from Tsinghua University, and Associate Professor Zhang Wei from Tsinghua University had a discussion on the relationship between generative artificial intelligence technology and new quality productive forces, monetary and financial productivity, and how to incorporate content related to new quality productive forces into ideological and political theory courses.
The "Workshop on Political Economy of Four Universities and One Institute" will seize the opportunity of this symposium to make greater contributions to promoting theoretical innovation and practice development in the field of political economy in China.
