Guiding High-Quality Development with a New Theory of Productive Forces

Developing new quality productive forces is the intrinsic requirement and key focus for promoting high-quality development. General Secretary Xi Jinping has emphasized that "high-quality development requires guidance from a new theory of productive forces, and new quality productive forces have already taken shape in practice and demonstrated a strong driving and supporting force for high-quality development, necessitating theoretical summarization and generalization to guide new development practices," and that "we must firmly grasp high-quality development as the primary task and develop new quality productive forces according to local conditions." Xi Jinping's series of important discourses on new quality productive forces represent an innovative development of the Marxist theory of productive forces, providing important guidance and pointing the way forward for effectively solving problems constraining high-quality development on the new journey and accelerating the cultivation and formation of new quality productive forces.

发展新质生产力是推动高质量发展的内在要求和重要着力点。习近平总书记强调，“高质量发展需要新的生产力理论来指导，而新质生产力已经在实践中形成并展示出对高质量发展的强劲推动力、支撑力，需要我们从理论上进行总结、概括，用以指导新的发展实践”“要牢牢把握高质量发展这个首要任务，因地制宜发展新质生产力”。习近平总书记关于新质生产力的一系列重要论述，是对马克思主义生产力理论的创新性发展，为在新征程上切实解决制约高质量发展的问题，加快培育和形成新质生产力，提供了重要遵循、指明了前进方向。

Marxism holds that productive forces are the most active and revolutionary factor and the ultimate decisive force in social development. Developing new quality productive forces embodies the objective requirement of liberating and developing social productive forces in the New Era and provides powerful momentum for promoting high-quality development. The report of the 20th National Congress of the CPC emphasized: "High-quality development is the primary task in building a modern socialist country in all respects. Development is the Party's top priority in governing and rejuvenating China. Without a solid material and technological foundation, it is impossible to build a great modern socialist country in all respects." The material and technological foundation depends mainly on the level of productive forces, which not only concentrate the level and degree of a country's modernization but are also an important factor affecting the modernization process. To deeply advance Chinese-path modernization, it is necessary to maximize the liberation and development of productive forces and promote high-quality economic and social development.

马克思主义认为，生产力是最活跃最革命的因素，是社会发展的最终决定力量。发展新质生产力，体现了新时代解放和发展社会生产力的客观要求，为推动高质量发展提供了强大动力支持。党的二十大报告强调：“高质量发展是全面建设社会主义现代化国家的首要任务。发展是党执政兴国的第一要务。没有坚实的物质技术基础，就不可能全面建成社会主义现代化强国。”物质技术基础主要取决于生产力水平，生产力不仅是一个国家现代化水平和程度的集中体现，也是影响现代化进程的重要因素。要深入推进中国式现代化，必须最大限度地解放和发展生产力，推动经济社会高质量发展。

China's economy has shifted from a stage of high-speed growth to a stage of high-quality development. High-quality development is development that can well meet the people's ever-growing needs for a better life, development that embodies the new development philosophy, and development where innovation becomes the primary driving force, coordination becomes an endogenous characteristic, green becomes a universal form, openness becomes the inevitable path, and sharing becomes the fundamental goal. Compared with traditional development theories that focus primarily on the growth of total economic output, high-quality development expands the content and levels of development and sets higher requirements for the quality and level of development. Achieving high-quality development requires optimizing the economic structure and cultivating new growth drivers. The formation and development of new quality productive forces align precisely with this. First, because new quality productive forces are productive forces where innovation plays a leading role, breaking away from traditional economic growth models and paths of productive forces development, and possessing characteristics such as high technology, high efficiency, and high quality, they are thus more conducive to continuously promoting the effective improvement of quality and reasonable growth of quantity in the economy. Second, because new quality productive forces take the leap in laborers, means of labor, objects of labor, and their optimized combination as their basic connotation, and a significant increase in total factor productivity as their core hallmark, they are thus conducive to the widespread application of emerging technologies represented by digital technology, accelerating the pace of building a strong nation in science and technology and a strong nation in cyberspace, and promoting the construction of people's livelihoods and achieving new substantive progress in promoting common prosperity for all the people. Third, because new quality productive forces are themselves green productive forces, possessing the characteristics of greening, low carbonization, and intelligence, they can thus play an important role in strengthening green manufacturing, developing green services, expanding the green energy industry, and building a green, low-carbon, circular economic system. It can be seen that accelerating the development of new quality productive forces is an inevitable choice for shaping new growth drivers, creating new development advantages, and gaining the initiative in development in the New Era.

我国经济已由高速增长阶段转向高质量发展阶段。高质量发展，就是能够很好满足人民日益增长的美好生活需要的发展，是体现新发展理念的发展，是创新成为第一动力、协调成为内生特点、绿色成为普遍形态、开放成为必由之路、共享成为根本目的的发展。与传统发展理论重点关注经济总量增长相比，高质量发展拓展了发展的内容和层次，对发展的质量和水平提出了更高的要求。实现高质量发展，必须优化经济结构，培育新的增长动力。新质生产力的形成和发展恰与之相契合。其一，由于新质生产力是创新起主导作用的生产力，摆脱了传统经济增长方式和生产力发展路径，具有高科技、高效能、高质量等特征，因而更有助于持续推动经济实现质的有效提升和量的合理增长。其二，由于新质生产力以劳动者、劳动资料、劳动对象及其优化组合的跃升为基本内涵，以全要素生产率大幅提升为核心标志，因而有助于以数字技术为代表的新兴技术的广泛应用，加快科技强国、网络强国建设步伐，并促进民生建设和推动全体人民共同富裕取得新的实质性进展。其三，由于新质生产力本身就是绿色生产力，具有绿色化、低碳化和智能化的特点，因而能够在做强绿色制造业、发展绿色服务业、壮大绿色能源产业、构建绿色低碳循环经济体系等方面发挥重要作用。可见，加快发展新质生产力是新时代塑造发展新动能、打造发展新优势、赢得发展主动权的必然选择。

Technological innovation can give rise to new industries, new models, and new growth drivers and is the core element for developing new quality productive forces. Achieving high-quality development requires realizing endogenous growth driven by innovation. It is necessary to accelerate the pace of technological innovation, break through key core technologies, vigorously promote technological innovation, especially original and disruptive technological innovation, fight the battle for key core technologies, enable original and disruptive technological innovation achievements to emerge in competition, promptly apply technological innovation achievements to specific industries and industrial chains, rely on China's super-large market scale and complete industrial system, create unique advantages conducive to the rapid large-scale application and iterative upgrading of new technologies, and promote the transformation of more technological achievements into actual productive forces.

科技创新能够催生新产业、新模式、新动能，是发展新质生产力的核心要素。实现高质量发展，必须实现依靠创新驱动的内涵型增长。要加快科技创新步伐，突破关键核心技术，大力推进科技创新特别是原创性、颠覆性科技创新，打好关键核心技术攻坚战，使原创性、颠覆性科技创新成果竞相涌现，并及时把科技创新成果应用到具体产业和产业链上，依托我国超大规模市场和完备产业体系，创造有利于新技术快速大规模应用和迭代升级的独特优势，推动更多科技成果转化为现实生产力。

Reform is the key to liberating and developing social productive forces and the fundamental driving force for promoting national development. Marxist historical materialism tells us that productive forces determine relations of production, relations of production react upon productive forces, and relations of production must adapt to the requirements of the development of productive forces. As society continuously moves forward, the systems and mechanisms regulating social relations and social activities must also be continuously improved, constantly adapting to the requirements of liberating and developing social productive forces. To develop new quality productive forces, it is necessary to stimulate endogenous momentum through comprehensively deepening reform, especially by deepening reforms in the economic system and the science and technology system, focusing on unblocking the bottlenecks and blockages constraining the development of new quality productive forces, and forming new types of relations of production that adapt to the development of new quality productive forces. At the same time, it is also necessary to further expand high-level opening up, shape new advantages of a higher-level open economy, and create a favorable international environment for the development of new quality productive forces.

改革是解放和发展社会生产力的关键，是推动国家发展的根本动力。马克思主义唯物史观告诉我们，生产力决定生产关系，生产关系反作用于生产力，生产关系必须与生产力发展要求相适应。社会不断向前发展，调节社会关系和社会活动的体制机制也要随之不断完善，不断适应解放和发展社会生产力的要求。发展新质生产力，必须通过全面深化改革激发内生动力，尤其是通过深化经济体制和科技体制等方面的改革，着力打通束缚新质生产力发展的堵点卡点，形成与新质生产力发展相适应的新型生产关系。同时，还要进一步扩大高水平对外开放，塑造更高水平开放型经济新优势，为发展新质生产力营造良好国际环境。

People are the most active factor in productive forces, and innovative talents are the foundation supporting high-quality development. Developing new quality productive forces requires further improving the systems and mechanisms for talent work. In accordance with the requirements for developing new quality productive forces, it is necessary to effectively utilize talents, this first resource, exert efforts in improving talent work mechanisms and increasing the intensity of talent cultivation, smooth the virtuous cycle of education, science and technology, and talent, stimulate the vitality of production factors such as labor, knowledge, technology, management, capital, and data, actively create a good atmosphere that encourages innovation and tolerates failure, fully unleash the creative vitality of talents in innovation, and provide strong talent support for promoting the development of new quality productive forces.

人是生产力中最活跃的因素，创新人才是支撑高质量发展的根基，发展新质生产力需进一步健全人才工作体制机制。要按照发展新质生产力的要求，切实用好人才这个第一资源，从完善人才工作机制、加大人才培养力度等方面发力，畅通教育、科技、人才的良性循环，激发劳动、知识、技术、管理、资本和数据等生产要素活力，积极营造鼓励创新、宽容失败的良好氛围，让人才创新创造活力充分迸发，为推动新质生产力发展提供强有力的人才支撑。

Online Editor: Paul

网络编辑：保罗