New Quality Productive Forces Are the Integration of Practice and Theoretical Innovation in the New Era

When discussing the theoretical innovation and scientific spirit of *Capital*, Engels proposed that “every new insight a science achieves constitutes a revolution in the terminology of that science.” Lenin pointed out that “only by reducing social relations to relations of production, and relations of production to the level of productive forces, can one obtain a reliable basis for regarding the development of social formations as a natural-historical process.” The theoretical innovation of new quality productive forces is grounded in the actual economic development of China since the 18th National Congress of the CPC and in the innovation of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics. At the same time, it provides a “reliable basis” for new economic practices and the innovation of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics, realizing a “revolution in the terminology” of Chinese economics and highlighting the theoretical realm of Xi Jinping’s economic thought.

恩格斯在论及《资本论》的理论创新和科学精神时提出，“一门科学提出的每一种新见解都包含这门科学的术语的革命”。列宁指出，“只有把社会关系归结于生产关系，把生产关系归结于生产力的水平，才能有可靠的根据把社会形态的发展看作自然历史过程”。新质生产力的理论创新，是以党的十八大以来中国经济发展的实际和中国经济学自主知识体系的创新为基础的，同时又为经济发展新的实践和经济学自主知识体系的创新提供了“可靠的根据”，实现了中国经济学的“术语的革命”，凸显了习近平经济思想的理论境界。

New quality productive forces are the sublimation of the “Chinese discourse” on productive forces in the New Era

新质生产力是新时代生产力“中国话语”的升华

Liberating and developing productive forces is an essential requirement for upholding and developing socialism with Chinese characteristics, and it is also an important connotation of Xi Jinping’s economic thought. After the 18th National Congress of the CPC, General Secretary Xi Jinping’s proposals to “maximally liberate and stimulate the enormous potential latent in science and technology as the primary productive force” and to “achieve an overall leap in the level of China’s social productive forces” are the theoretical cornerstones for understanding the essential characteristics and basic connotations of new quality productive forces, and they also constitute the academic foundation for the Chinese discourse expression of new quality productive forces.

解放生产力和发展生产力是坚持和发展中国特色社会主义的本质要求，也是习近平经济思想的重要内涵。党的十八大以后，习近平总书记提出的“最大限度解放和激发科技作为第一生产力所蕴藏的巨大潜能”和“实现我国社会生产力水平总体跃升”，是认识和理解新质生产力的本质特征和基本内涵的理论基石，也是新质生产力中国话语表达的学理基础。

In response to new changes in the development trends of the world and China’s economy, society, and science and technology since the beginning of the 21st century, General Secretary Xi Jinping, as early as 2014, made a new judgment from the height of the development of social productive forces regarding the role of engineering science and technology in advancing scientific and technological progress. He argued that “human survival is closely related to the level of development of social productive forces, and an important source of the development of social productive forces is engineering science and technology.” The third industrial revolution triggered by information technology in the second half of the 20th century transformed social production and consumption from industrialization to automation and intelligence, leading to major breakthroughs in engineering science and technology and achieving a direct integration of scientific discovery with industrial development. Engineering science and technology became the main driving force of economic and social development and its processes, making the important role of science and technology as the primary productive force even more prominent in the national innovation-driven development strategy. General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed: “To develop, we must give full play to the role of science and technology as the primary productive force. We have made the innovation-driven development strategy a major national strategy, focusing on promoting innovation in engineering science and technology, and achieving a shift from development driven mainly by factor input and investment scale to development driven mainly by innovation.” This profoundly grasps the new trend, under the effect of engineering science and technology, of the development of social productive forces shifting from quantitative growth to qualitative change.

根据进入21世纪以来世界和中国经济社会和科学技术发展态势的新变化，习近平总书记2014年就从社会生产力发展的高度，对工程科技在推进科学技术进步中的作用作出新的判断，认为“人类生存与社会生产力发展水平密切相关，而社会生产力发展的一个重要源头就是工程科技”。20世纪下半叶信息技术引发的第三次产业革命，使社会生产和消费从工业化向自动化、智能化转变，使工程科技出现重大突破，实现了科学发现同产业发展的直接结合。工程科技成为经济社会发展及其过程的主要驱动力，使科学技术作为第一生产力在国家创新驱动发展战略中的重要作用更加凸显。习近平总书记提出：“要发展就必须充分发挥科学技术第一生产力的作用。我们把创新驱动发展战略作为国家重大战略，着力推动工程科技创新，实现从以要素驱动、投资规模驱动发展为主转向以创新驱动发展为主。”这深刻把握了在工程科技作用下社会生产力发展呈现出由数量增速向质态变化的新趋势。

The 18th National Congress of the CPC made a major deployment to implement the innovation-driven development strategy, emphasizing that scientific and technological innovation is the strategic support for improving social productive forces and comprehensive national strength and must be placed at the core of the overall national development. At the Joint Conference of the 17th Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the 12th Academicians of the Chinese Academy of Engineering held in June 2014, General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that “implementing the innovation-driven development strategy, the most fundamental thing is to enhance independent innovation capability, and the most urgent thing is to break down institutional and mechanistic barriers, maximally liberating and stimulating the enormous potential latent in science and technology as the primary productive force.” The summary of “maximally liberating and stimulating the enormous potential latent in science and technology as the primary productive force” further deepened the theory that science and technology are the primary productive force, reflected a new understanding of the transformation of productive forces in the new scientific and technological revolution, and served as the cornerstone for the formation of the theory of new quality productive forces.

党的十八大作出了实施创新驱动发展战略的重大部署，强调科技创新是提高社会生产力和综合国力的战略支撑，必须摆在国家发展全局的核心位置。在2014年6月召开的中国科学院第十七次院士大会、中国工程院第十二次院士大会上，习近平总书记指出，“实施创新驱动发展战略，最根本的是要增强自主创新能力，最紧迫的是要破除体制机制障碍，最大限度解放和激发科技作为第一生产力所蕴藏的巨大潜能”。对“最大限度解放和激发科技作为第一生产力所蕴藏的巨大潜能”的概括，进一步深化了科学技术是第一生产力理论，体现了对新科学技术革命中生产力变革的新认识，是新质生产力理论形成的基石。

Grasping the grand logic of China’s economic development from the perspective of “achieving an overall leap in the level of China’s social productive forces” was the concentrated embodiment of General Secretary Xi Jinping’s exploration of the Chinese discourse on the theory of productive forces after the 18th National Congress of the CPC. In July 2014, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized, “Strive to improve innovation-driven development capability, enhance industrial competitiveness, improve the quality and efficiency of economic growth, and achieve an overall leap in the level of China’s social productive forces.” The economy entering a new normal has not changed the judgment that China’s development is still in an important period of strategic opportunity with much to be accomplished; what has changed are the connotation and conditions of this important period of strategic opportunity. It has not changed the fundamentals of China’s overall positive economic development; what has changed are the economic development model and economic structure. The Chinese discourse marked by an “overall leap in the level of social productive forces” is a profound condensation of theoretical exploration on productive forces and a theoretical cornerstone for proposing new quality productive forces.

从“实现我国社会生产力水平总体跃升”的视角，把握中国经济发展的大逻辑，是党的十八大以后习近平总书记对生产力理论中国话语探索的集中体现。2014年7月，习近平总书记强调，“努力提高创新驱动发展能力、提高产业竞争力、提高经济增长质量和效益，实现我国社会生产力水平总体跃升”。经济发展进入新常态，没有改变我国发展仍处于可以大有作为的重要战略机遇期的判断，改变的是重要战略机遇期的内涵和条件；没有改变我国经济发展总体向好的基本面，改变的是经济发展方式和经济结构。以“社会生产力水平总体跃升”为标志的中国话语，是关于生产力理论探索的深刻凝练，是提出新质生产力的理论基石。

The two theoretical cornerstones of “maximally liberating and stimulating the enormous potential latent in science and technology as the primary productive force” and “achieving an overall leap in the level of China’s social productive forces” elucidate the “enormous potential” for productive forces to form a new qualitative state and clarify the powerful role of new quality productive forces in achieving an “overall leap.”

“最大限度解放和激发科技作为第一生产力所蕴藏的巨大潜能”和“实现我国社会生产力水平总体跃升”的两大理论基石，阐明了生产力形成新的质态的“巨大潜能”，阐明了新质生产力对“总体跃升”的强大作用。

New quality productive forces embody the essence of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics

新质生产力体现中国经济学自主知识体系精粹

The theory of new quality productive forces is a new major enrichment and development of Xi Jinping’s economic thought, an integration based on the essence of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics, such as the new development philosophy, the new development stage, and the new development pattern. In the *Explanation of the Proposal of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Formulating the Thirteenth Five-Year Plan for National Economic and Social Development*, General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed that “the development philosophy is the precursor of development action, something that governs the overall situation, the fundamentals, the direction, and the long term, and is the concentrated embodiment of development ideas, development direction, and development focus.” The new development philosophy is the leading theory of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics, establishing the fundamental characteristics of innovation, coordination, greenness, openness, and sharing inherent in new quality productive forces. Innovation-driven development focuses on solving the problem of development momentum and is the primary driving force leading development; coordinated development focuses on solving the problem of unbalanced development and is an inherent requirement for sustained and healthy development; green development focuses on solving the problem of harmony between humans and nature and is a necessary condition for sustainable development and an important manifestation of the people’s pursuit of a better life; open development focuses on solving the problem of internal and external linkages in development and is the only way for national prosperity and development; shared development highlights solving the problem of social fairness and justice and is an essential requirement of socialism with Chinese characteristics. These five development concepts form an organic whole of “advocating innovation, emphasizing coordination, promoting greenness, deepening openness, and advancing sharing,” forging the main connotations and basic characteristics of new quality productive forces.

新质生产力理论是习近平经济思想的新的重大丰富和发展，是基于新发展理念、新发展阶段和新发展格局等中国经济学自主知识体系精粹的集成。在《关于〈中共中央关于制定国民经济和社会发展第十三个五年规划的建议〉的说明》中，习近平总书记提出，“发展理念是发展行动的先导，是管全局、管根本、管方向、管长远的东西，是发展思路、发展方向、发展着力点的集中体现”。新发展理念是中国经济学自主知识体系的主导性理论，确立了新质生产力所蕴含的创新、协调、绿色、开放、共享的根本特性。创新发展，注重解决发展动力问题，是引领发展的第一动力；协调发展，着力解决发展不平衡问题，是持续健康发展的内在要求；绿色发展，集中解决人与自然和谐问题，是永续发展的必要条件和人民对美好生活追求的重要体现；开放发展，注重解决发展内外联动问题，是国家繁荣发展的必由之路；共享发展，突出解决社会公平正义问题，是中国特色社会主义的本质要求。这五大发展理念，形成“崇尚创新、注重协调、倡导绿色、厚植开放、推进共享”的有机整体，铸就新质生产力的主要内涵和基本特征。

The year 2020 was the year of completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects and the successful conclusion of the 13th Five-Year Plan. In this milestone year, General Secretary Xi Jinping proposed to establish a new development pattern with domestic circulation as the mainstay and domestic and international circulations reinforcing each other, emphasizing that “the 14th Five-Year Plan period is the first five years in which China, after completing the building of a moderately prosperous society in all respects and achieving the first centenary goal, will build on the momentum to embark on a new journey of comprehensively building a modern socialist country and march toward the second centenary goal. China will enter a new development stage.” The new development stage and the new development pattern are important symbols of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics, theoretically establishing the basic pattern of the “new quality” of China’s productive forces undergoing partial qualitative change amidst rapid quantitative change.

2020年是全面建成小康社会和“十三五”规划圆满收官之年。在这个具有里程碑意义的一年，习近平总书记提出要建立以国内大循环为主体、国内国际双循环相互促进的新发展格局，强调“‘十四五’时期是我国全面建成小康社会、实现第一个百年奋斗目标之后，乘势而上开启全面建设社会主义现代化国家新征程、向第二个百年奋斗目标进军的第一个五年，我国将进入新发展阶段”。新发展阶段和新发展格局是中国经济学自主知识体系的重要标志，从理论上确立了我国生产力快速量变中正在发生部分质变的“新质”的基本样态。

Entering the new stage of development, the profound changes in the domestic and international environment have brought a series of new opportunities and new challenges. The people's demands for a better life are constantly increasing, the problem of unbalanced and inadequate development in our country remains prominent, innovation capacity does not meet the requirements of high-quality development, ecological and environmental protection has a long way to go, there are shortcomings in livelihood security, and there are still weaknesses in social governance. To achieve high-quality development, it is necessary to realize connotative growth driven by innovation. The new stage of development highlights the fundamental characteristics and development path of using scientific and technological innovation to generate new drivers of development, deepening reform to stimulate new vitality for development, and using high-level opening up to create new advantages in international cooperation and competition. At the same time, the new stage of development must also, through innovation, expand new prospects for social development based on joint contribution, shared governance, and shared benefits, adapt to profound changes in social structure, social relations, social behavior patterns, and social psychology, achieve more full and higher-quality employment, improve a comprehensive and sustainable social security system, strengthen the public health and disease control system, and promote the long-term balanced development of the population. The changes in the "new quality" form of productive forces induced by the new stage of development inherently require the promotion of the improvement and development of relations of production and the advancement of the modernization of the national governance system and governance capacity. Accelerating the formation of a new development pattern with domestic circulation as the mainstay and domestic and international circulations reinforcing each other aims to promote the sustained and holistic development of domestic economic processes and links under the new situation, further cultivate new advantages for our country's participation in international cooperation and competition, and enable the new development pattern to promote and boost the leap of China's comprehensive opening-up new pattern. The new development pattern must take meeting domestic demand as the starting point and ultimate goal of development, accelerate the construction of a complete domestic demand system, vigorously promote scientific and technological innovation and other innovations in all aspects, accelerate the development of strategic emerging industries such as the digital economy, intelligent manufacturing, life and health, and new materials, form more new growth points and growth poles, and align the new planning of the economic development pattern with the actual changes in the economic process. To accelerate the construction of the new development pattern, it is necessary to adhere to promoting high-quality development as the theme, organically combine the implementation of the strategy of expanding domestic demand with deepening supply-side structural reform, focus on improving total factor productivity, focus on enhancing the resilience and security level of the industrial chain and supply chain, focus on promoting urban-rural integration and coordinated regional development, and promote the effective improvement of quality and reasonable growth of the economy. The new development pattern is based on the formation of the "new quality" of productive forces, and the qualitative leap in productive forces is the fundamental driving force for the formation of the new development pattern.

进入新发展阶段，国内外环境的深刻变化带来一系列新机遇和新挑战。人民对美好生活的要求不断提高，我国发展不平衡不充分问题仍然突出，创新能力不适应高质量发展要求，生态环保任重道远，民生保障存在短板，社会治理还有弱项。实现高质量发展，必须实现依靠创新驱动的内涵型增长。新发展阶段凸显以科技创新催生新发展动能、以深化改革激发新发展活力、以高水平对外开放打造国际合作和竞争新优势的根本特征和发展路向。同时，新发展阶段还要通过创新以共建共治共享拓展社会发展新局面，适应社会结构、社会关系、社会行为方式、社会心理等深刻变化，实现更加充分、更高质量的就业，健全全覆盖、可持续的社保体系，强化公共卫生和疾控体系，促进人口长期均衡发展等。新发展阶段引致的生产力“新质”样态变化，内在地要求推进生产关系的完善和发展，推进国家治理体系和治理能力现代化。加快形成以国内大循环为主体、国内国际双循环相互促进的新发展格局，旨在推进新形势下国内经济过程和环节之间的持续性、整体性发展，进一步培育我国参与国际合作和竞争新优势，使新发展格局促进和助推中国全面开放新格局的跃升。新发展格局要把满足国内需求作为发展的出发点和落脚点，加快构建完整的内需体系，大力推进科技创新及其他各方面创新，加快推进数字经济、智能制造、生命健康、新材料等战略性新兴产业发展，形成更多新的增长点、增长极，使对经济发展格局的新谋划与经济过程变化的实际相契合。加快构建新发展格局，要坚持以推动高质量发展为主题，把实施扩大内需战略同深化供给侧结构性改革有机结合起来，着力提高全要素生产率，着力提升产业链供应链韧性和安全水平，着力推进城乡融合和区域协调发展，推动经济实现质的有效提升和量的合理增长。新发展格局是以生产力的“新质”的形成为基础的，生产力的质的跃升是新发展格局得以形成的根本动力。

The new development philosophy, the new stage of development, and the new development pattern have become extremely rich sources of the ideological connotation, academic implication, and theoretical characteristics of new quality productive forces. At the same time, the formation of new quality productive forces has enabled both the new development philosophy and the new stage of development and the new development pattern to acquire "reliable foundations" for the New Era.

新发展理念、新发展阶段和新发展格局，成为新质生产力思想内涵、学术意蕴和理论特征的极其丰富的来源。同时，新质生产力的形成，使得无论是新发展理念还是新发展阶段、新发展格局，都获得了新时代的“可靠的根据”。

New quality productive forces are the fundamental momentum of the modernized economic system and high-quality development

新质生产力是现代化经济体系和高质量发展的根本势能

Our country has entered the stage of high-quality development, and the principal contradiction in society has been transformed into the contradiction between the people's ever-growing needs for a better life and unbalanced and inadequate development. This requires in-depth research on market changes, understanding of actual demand and potential demand, and better meeting the people's ever-growing needs for a better life in the process of liberating and developing social productive forces. On the new journey of comprehensively building a modern socialist country, the internal driving force of "needs" triggers the new development of social productive forces, becoming the basis for the development of new quality productive forces; as a revolutionary force promoting comprehensive social development and progress, new quality productive forces will maximize the liberation and stimulation of the huge potential of social productive forces, promoting the overall leap in the level of social productive forces in the New Era.

我国已进入高质量发展阶段，社会主要矛盾已经转化为人民日益增长的美好生活需要和不平衡不充分的发展之间的矛盾。这就需要深入研究市场变化，理解现实需求和潜在需求，在解放和发展社会生产力中更好满足人民日益增长的美好生活需要。全面建设社会主义现代化国家新征程上，“需要”的内在动力引发社会生产力的新的发展，成为新质生产力发展的根据；新质生产力作为推进社会全面发展和进步的革命力量，将最大限度地解放和激发社会生产力的巨大潜能，推动实现新时代社会生产力水平的总体跃升。

Building a modernized economic system is the strategic goal of our country's development and an inevitable requirement for promoting high-quality development and comprehensively improving the overall competitiveness of the economy. The modernized economic system is an organic whole composed of the interrelationships and internal connections of various links, levels, and fields of social and economic activities, covering the following aspects: building an industrial system led by innovation and coordinated development; building a unified, open, competitive, and orderly market system; building an income distribution system that reflects efficiency and promotes fairness; building an urban-rural regional development system that highlights advantages and coordinates linkage; building a green development system that is resource-saving and environmentally friendly; building a comprehensive opening-up system that is diversified, balanced, safe, and efficient; and building an economic system that fully leverages the role of the market and better plays the role of the government. The development of these seven aspects must take the formation of the "new quality" of social productive forces as a prerequisite and condition. Only by accelerating the cultivation and development of new quality productive forces, liberating and stimulating huge potential, and achieving an overall leap in the level of social productive forces can the goals of building a modernized economic system be achieved.

建设现代化经济体系是我国发展的战略目标，是推动高质量发展、全面提高经济整体竞争力的必然要求。现代化经济体系，是由社会经济活动各个环节、各个层面、各个领域的相互关系和内在联系构成的有机整体，涵盖以下方面：建设创新引领、协同发展的产业体系；建设统一开放、竞争有序的市场体系；建设体现效率、促进公平的收入分配体系；建设彰显优势、协调联动的城乡区域发展体系；建设资源节约、环境友好的绿色发展体系；建设多元平衡、安全高效的全面开放体系；建设充分发挥市场作用、更好发挥政府作用的经济体制。这七个方面的发展，要以社会生产力的“新质”形成为前提、为条件。只有加快培育和发展新质生产力，解放和激发巨大潜能，实现社会生产力水平总体跃升，才能达到现代化经济体系建设的目标。

Building a modernized economic system is a major theoretical proposition and practical subject for China's economic development in the New Era. It is necessary to take supply-side structural reform as the main line, focus on promoting quality change, efficiency change, and dynamic change in economic development, improve total factor productivity, and accelerate the construction of an industrial system with coordinated development of the real economy, scientific and technological innovation, modern finance, and human resources; it is necessary to take accelerating the construction of an innovative country as strategic support, target the world's scientific and technological frontiers, strengthen basic research, achieve major breakthroughs in forward-looking basic research and leading original achievements, strengthen the construction of the national innovation system, and strengthen strategic scientific and technological forces. The construction of a modernized economic system needs to be driven and based on the development of new quality productive forces, and new quality productive forces can exert huge potential in the modernized economic system.

建设现代化经济体系是新时代中国经济发展的重大理论命题和实践课题。要以供给侧结构性改革为主线，着力推动经济发展质量变革、效率变革、动力变革，提高全要素生产率，加快建设实体经济、科技创新、现代金融、人力资源协同发展的产业体系；要以加快创新型国家建设为战略支撑，瞄准世界科技前沿，强化基础研究，实现前瞻性基础研究、引领性原创成果重大突破，加强国家创新体系建设，强化战略科技力量。现代化经济体系建设需要以新质生产力发展为动力、为基础，新质生产力在现代化经济体系中能够发挥巨大潜能。

Achieving high-quality development is the key to building a modernized economic system. High-quality development requires a relatively complete industrial system, networked and intelligent production organization methods, strong innovation, demand capture, brand influence, and core competitiveness, and high product and service quality. From the perspective of demand, high-quality development should continuously meet the personalized, diversified, and constantly upgrading needs of the people. This demand leads to changes in the supply system and structure, and supply changes continuously generate new demand. From the perspective of input and output, high-quality development should continuously improve labor efficiency, capital efficiency, land efficiency, resource efficiency, and environmental efficiency, continuously increase the contribution rate of scientific and technological progress, and continuously improve total factor productivity. To achieve high-quality development, it is fundamentally necessary to promote the effective improvement of quality and reasonable growth of the economy. This first requires that social productive forces themselves "achieve effective improvement in quality" and unleash the huge potential of productive forces.

实现高质量发展是建设现代化经济体系的关键所在。高质量发展要求实现产业体系比较完整，生产组织方式网络化、智能化，创新力、需求捕捉力、品牌影响力、核心竞争力强，产品和服务质量高。从需求看，高质量发展应该不断满足人民群众个性化、多样化、不断升级的需求，这种需求引领供给体系和结构的变化，供给变革又不断催生新的需求。从投入产出看，高质量发展应该不断提高劳动效率、资本效率、土地效率、资源效率、环境效率，不断提升科技进步贡献率，不断提高全要素生产率。实现高质量发展，根本上是要推动经济实现质的有效提升和量的合理增长，这就首先要求社会生产力自身“实现质的有效提升”，发挥生产力的巨大潜能。

High-quality development and the modernized economic system must inevitably be promoted and supported through the cultivation and development of new quality productive forces. New quality productive forces are both the inevitable prerequisite and decisive force for our country to achieve high-quality development and the solid foundation and fundamental driving force for building a modernized economic system.

高质量发展和现代化经济体系，必然要通过新质生产力的培育和发展来推动和支撑。新质生产力既是我国实现高质量发展的必然前提和决定力量，也是建设现代化经济体系的坚实基础和根本动力。

New quality productive forces are the advanced productive force form for comprehensively advancing Chinese-path modernization. New quality productive forces are the concentrated embodiment of the leap in the level of advanced productive forces in the New Era. The characteristics of the leap in productive forces are manifested in the entire process of laborers, means of labor, objects of labor, and their optimized combination, and in new industries, new models, and new drivers with innovative science and technology, especially engineering technology and cutting-edge technology, as the core. The formation of new quality productive forces is a scientific summary of the basic economic facts that already exist and continue to develop in the actual process of economic and social development, especially the basic facts of the process of Chinese-path modernization in the new stage of development.

新质生产力是全面推进中国式现代化的先进生产力质态新质生产力是新时代先进生产力水平跃升的集中体现。生产力跃升的特征，呈现于以劳动者、劳动资料、劳动对象及其优化组合的全部过程之中，呈现于以创新性科学技术特别是工程技术和前沿技术为内核的新产业、新模式、新动能之中。新质生产力的形成，是现实的经济社会发展过程已经存在并继续发展的基本的经济事实、特别是新发展阶段中国式现代化建设过程的基本事实的科学概括。

The comprehensive advancement of Chinese-path modernization is a dynamic, proactive, and always vibrant process imbued with the vitality of new quality productive forces in the new stage of development. The report of the 20th National Congress of the CPC set forth the overall goals for China’s development by 2035, including: a substantial leap in economic strength, scientific and technological strength, and comprehensive national power; per capita gross domestic product reaching a new major threshold, attaining the level of moderately developed countries; achieving high-level self-reliance and self-strengthening in science and technology, and entering the forefront of innovative countries; building a modernized economic system, forming a new pattern of development, and basically realizing new industrialization, informatization, urbanization, and agricultural modernization; making people’s lives happier and more fulfilling, raising per capita disposable income of residents to a new level, significantly increasing the proportion of the middle-income group, achieving equal access to basic public services, basically equipping rural areas with modern living conditions, maintaining long-term social stability, and achieving more notable substantive progress in people’s all-round development and common prosperity for all; broadly forming green production and lifestyles, achieving a steady decline in carbon emissions after peaking, fundamentally improving the ecological environment, and basically realizing the goal of a Beautiful China; and so on. These grand goals are all inseparably and intrinsically linked to the development of new quality productive forces. Whether we can maximize the liberation and stimulation of the immense potential latent in science and technology as the primary productive force, achieve an overall leap in the level of China’s social productive forces, and accelerate the development of new quality productive forces has in practice become a key issue in basically realizing the goal of socialist modernization.

中国式现代化的全面推进，是新发展阶段中一个动态的、积极有为的、始终洋溢着新质生产力生机活力的过程。党的二十大报告提出了到2035年我国发展的总体目标，其中包括：经济实力、科技实力、综合国力大幅跃升，人均国内生产总值迈上新的大台阶，达到中等发达国家水平；实现高水平科技自立自强、进入创新型国家前列；建成现代化经济体系，形成新发展格局，基本实现新型工业化、信息化、城镇化、农业现代化；人民生活更加幸福美好，居民人均可支配收入再上新台阶，中等收入群体比重明显提高，基本公共服务实现均等化，农村基本具备现代生活条件，社会保持长期稳定，人的全面发展、全体人民共同富裕取得更为明显的实质性进展；广泛形成绿色生产生活方式，碳排放达峰后稳中有降，生态环境根本好转，美丽中国目标基本实现；等等。这些宏伟目标，无不与新质生产力的发展有着不可分割的内在联系。能否最大限度解放和激发科技作为第一生产力所蕴藏的巨大潜能，实现我国社会生产力水平总体跃升，加快发展新质生产力，已经实际地成为基本实现社会主义现代化奋斗目标的重要问题。

Chinese-path modernization must be based on and driven by the development of new quality productive forces; the development of new quality productive forces is also the marker and verification of the comprehensive advancement of Chinese-path modernization. To comprehensively advance Chinese-path modernization, first, the development of the subjective capacity of the labor process is indispensable. The labor capacity of workers can be elevated to new heights through scientific and technological innovation. Workers who master advanced technology and scientific knowledge and can adapt to the requirements of digitalization and intelligence in the labor process are increasingly becoming the main force in the process of liberating and developing productive forces. Second, the means of labor, as the object of the labor process, are undergoing qualitative changes; advanced engineering technology is undergoing new transformations under the influence of new industries and new drivers; entirely new means of labor, such as artificial intelligence, virtual reality and augmented reality devices, and automated manufacturing equipment, are increasingly becoming important forces driving the development of productive forces; scientific and technological innovation, especially original and disruptive scientific and technological achievements, are emerging in competition, forming new drivers for new quality productive forces in the labor process. Third, the objects of labor, as the object of the labor process, are also undergoing qualitative changes; new objects of labor, such as new materials and new energy, are releasing immense potential with the help of high-end intelligent equipment in material form, especially new production factors including non-physical forms such as data. New quality productive forces are the advanced qualitative state of productive forces for comprehensively advancing Chinese-path modernization, and Chinese-path modernization also fully displays the epochal brilliance of a new form of human civilization in the eruption of the potential and latent energy of new quality productive forces.

中国式现代化要以新质生产力的发展为基础和动力，新质生产力的发展也是中国式现代化全面推进的标识和验证。全面推进中国式现代化，首先离不开劳动过程主体能力的发展。劳动者的劳动能力通过科技创新可以提升到新的高度。掌握先进技术和科学知识，在劳动过程中能够适应数字化、智能化要求的劳动者，日益成为解放和发展生产力过程的主体力量。其次，作为劳动过程客体的劳动资料，发生着质态上的新变化，先进的工程技术在新产业、新动能的作用下发生着新的变革，人工智能、虚拟现实和增强现实设备、自动化制造设备等全新的劳动资料，日益成为推动生产力发展的重要力量；科技创新特别是原创性、颠覆性科技创新成果竞相涌现，形成劳动过程中新质生产力的新动能。再次，作为劳动过程客体的劳动对象，同样发生着质态上的新变化，新材料、新能源等新的劳动对象，借助物质形态的高端智能设备特别是包括数据等非实体形态的新型生产要素，释放出巨大的潜能。新质生产力是全面推进中国式现代化的先进生产力质态，中国式现代化也在新质生产力势能和潜能的迸发中尽显人类文明新形态的时代光辉。

Since the 18th National Congress of the CPC, from the new normal of the economy, supply-side structural reform, the new development philosophy, the new pattern of development, the new stage of development, the modernized economic system, and high-quality development, to the comprehensive advancement of Chinese-path modernization, this has not only delineated the practical process of socialist economic development with Chinese characteristics in the New Era but has also achieved the theoretical innovation of the independent knowledge system of Chinese economics. The “revolution in terminology” [6]6 “Revolution in terminology” (术语的革命) is a concept Marx used to describe how new scientific concepts fundamentally transform the categories and language of a field of knowledge, as seen in his critique of political economy. realized by new quality productive forces is precisely the integration of this practical process and theoretical innovation, highlighting Chinese wisdom and Chinese strength.

党的十八大以来，从经济新常态、供给侧结构性改革、新发展理念、新发展格局、新发展阶段、现代化经济体系、高质量发展，到全面推进中国式现代化，不仅刻画了新时代中国特色社会主义经济发展的实践过程，同时也成就了中国经济学自主知识体系的理论创新，新质生产力所实现的“术语的革命”就是这一实践过程和理论创新的集成，彰显了中国智慧和中国力量。

(Author: Gu Hailiang, Professor, School of Marxism, Peking University)

（作者：顾海良，北京大学马克思主义学院教授）

Online Editor: You Heng

网络编辑：有恒