The Theoretical Exploration Process of the CPC’s People-Centered Thought

“People-centered” is a conceptual category with a sense of history and holism, which itself contains rich connotations of the times. Over the past century and more, in the face of many challenges such as the transition of modes of production, rapid adjustment of social structure, risks in the international environment, and the diversification of social ideologies, the Communist Party of China has always adhered to the development concept of being “people-centered.” In the process of adapting to the ever-changing practice, its people-centered thought has matured through a century of sedimentation. In October 2022, the 20th National Congress of the CPC, starting from the essential requirements of Chinese-path modernization and taking the comprehensive construction of a modern socialist country as its development goal, proposed that five major principles must be firmly grasped. Among them, the development thought of “adhering to a people-centered approach” emphasizes safeguarding the fundamental interests of the people, improving people’s well-being, and continuously realizing development for the people, development relying on the people, and development achievements shared by the people, so that the fruits of modernization benefit all the people more and more fairly. In the discourse system of the CPC, the core values of the Party’s people-centered thought have changed historically and inheritably, forming a core value system of “each getting his due,” “common prosperity,” and “shared development” at the theoretical level, and completing the historical task of integrating various social classes and strata in different historical periods at the practical level, realizing a functional evolution from mobilization strategy to value guidance. “The people” have become the organic unity of the subject of material production, the subject of political power, and the subject of value realization.

“人民主体”是一个具备历史感、整体性的概念范畴，它本身蕴含着丰富的时代内涵。在过去一个多世纪的时间里，面对生产方式跃迁、社会结构迅速调整、国际环境风险横生、社会意识形态多元化等诸多挑战，中国共产党始终坚持“以人民为中心”的发展理念，在适应瞬息万变的实践进程中，其人民主体思想历经百年沉淀日臻成熟。2022年10月，党的二十大从中国式现代化的本质要求出发，以全面建设社会主义现代化国家为发展目标，提出必须牢牢把握五项重大原则。其中，“坚持以人民为中心”的发展思想，强调维护人民根本利益，增进民生福祉，不断实现发展为了人民、发展依靠人民、发展成果由人民共享，让现代化建设成果更多更公平惠及全体人民。在中国共产党的话语体系中，党的人民主体思想核心价值历史地继承地发展变化着，在理论层面形成了“各得其所”“共同富裕”“共享发展”的核心价值体系，在实践层面完成了不同历史时期整合社会各阶级阶层的历史任务，实现了由动员策略到价值引领的功能演进。“人民”成为了物质生产主体、政治权力主体与价值实现主体的有机统一。

I. Political Integration: “Each Getting His Due” as a Mobilization Strategy in the Revolutionary Period

一、政治整合：“各得其所”作为革命时期的动员策略

Mao Zedong once pointed out: “The concept of ‘the people’ has different content in different countries and in different historical periods of each country.” The period of the New Democratic Revolution was a transitional period for China from a traditional agricultural country to a modern industrial country. Due to being deeply mired in a national crisis, the impact of war-induced social turmoil and loose political structure was even greater than that of the socio-economic level. During this period, the extension of the people-centered subject expanded unprecedentedly, the subject structure was rich in layers, including all groups in the middle and bottom strata of Chinese society at that time, as well as some groups in the upper strata with an inclination toward the united front. Although these groups still bore strong characteristics of the social subjects of a traditional agricultural country—being in the established relations of production formed with land as the means of production, generally lacking the concept of a modern nation-state, and lacking conscious subject consciousness—this also reflected that, under the guidance of the Anti-Japanese National United Front, the CPC urgently needed to construct a form of political power organization that could represent the fundamental interests of the broadest masses of the people, continuously empower the subjects, and complete the urgency of the “trinity” of political identity of national independence, civil rights freedom, and people’s livelihood happiness.

毛泽东曾指出：“人民这个概念在不同的国家和各个国家的不同的历史时期，有着不同的内容。”新民主主义革命时期是中国由传统农业型国家向现代工业国家转型的过渡时期。由于深陷民族危机，相较于社会经济层面的影响，战争所带来的社会动荡、政治结构松散的影响更甚。这一时期人民主体的外延空前扩大，主体结构层次丰富，包含了当时中国社会中间和底层社会的全部群体，还包括上层社会的部分有统战意向的群体。尽管这些群体仍带有强烈的传统农业国家社会主体特征——处在以土地为生产资料所形成的既定生产关系中，普遍缺乏现代民族国家观念，也缺乏自觉的主体意识，但也由此反映出在抗日民族统一战线的统摄下，中国共产党亟须建构起能代表最广大人民根本利益的政权组织形式，不断赋权主体，完成民族独立、民权自由、民生幸福“三位一体”政治认同的紧迫性。

(1) Locking onto the Revolutionary Subject in the “Small at Both Ends, Large in the Middle” Social Structure

（一）锁定“两头小，中间大”社会结构中的革命主体

Before the Opium War, China was a “state” that was very loose and fragmented in terms of actual political organization. This concept of the state was entirely different from the modern nation-state as a political organizational form and an imagined community. At that time, the common people lacked national cognition of war, believing it to be the court’s war, and their subjective identity was extremely lacking. Later, under the rule of the Kuomintang regime, China was still a national structure lacking communication and linkage between the upper and lower strata of society. It was not until the early period of the New Democratic Revolution that the Chinese Communists, mainly represented by Comrade Mao Zedong, on the basis of Marxist class analysis theory, through specific understanding, estimation, and grasp of the balance of forces between the two camps of the revolutionary ranks and the revolutionary objects, initially depicted a social class structure schema of “small at both ends, large in the middle.”

鸦片战争以前，中国是一个在实际政权组织层面十分松散且各自为政的“国家”，这个国家概念与现代民族国家作为政治组织形式与想象的共同体全然不同。当时的老百姓对于战争缺乏国民认知，认为那是朝廷的战争，此时的主体性认同极度缺失。而后国民党政权统治下的中国，仍旧是一个上层社会与底层社会缺乏沟通与联动性的国家结构。直到新民主主义革命初期，以毛泽东同志为主要代表的中国共产党人在马克思主义阶级分析理论的基础上，通过对革命队伍和革命对象两个阵营之间力量对比的具体认识、估量和把握，初步描绘出了一个“两头小，中间大”的社会阶级结构图式。

In the process of Western capitalist countries opening the door of the Chinese market and importing capital into China, two “new social classes” emerged from traditional Chinese feudal society—one was the bourgeoisie developed from merchants, landlords, and bureaucrats, and the other was the proletariat developed from peasants and handicraft workers. They were both interrelated and opposed to each other, the twins of China’s old society (feudal society). Because the imperialist powers colluded with domestic feudal forces, a reactionary ruling class represented by the comprador class, the feudal landlord class, and the commercial and usury bourgeoisie was created. In addition, imperialism vigorously developed industry and commerce in China, which led to some development of China’s national capitalism, “and played a considerable role in China’s political and cultural life; however, it did not become the main form of China’s social economy, its strength was very weak, and most of it was more or less connected with foreign imperialism and domestic feudalism,” and thus it did not create a strong working class opposed to it in China.

西方资本主义国家在打开中国市场大门对华输入资本的过程中，促使中国传统封建社会中脱胎而出了两个“新的社会阶级”——一个是从商人、地主和官僚发展而来的资产阶级，另一个则是从农民和手工业者发展而来的无产阶级，他们既相互关联又相互对立，是中国旧社会（封建社会）的双生子。由于帝国主义列强与国内封建势力相互勾结，造成了一个以买办阶级、封建地主阶级以及商业和高利贷资产阶级为代表的反动统治阶级；此外，帝国主义大肆在中国本土发展工商业，使得中国的民族资本主义有了某些发展，“并在中国政治的、文化的生活中起了颇大的作用；但是，它没有成为中国社会经济的主要形式，它的力量是很软弱的，它的大部分是对于外国帝国主义和国内封建主义都有或多或少的联系的”，因而并没有在中国造成一个与之相对的强有力的工人阶级。

In the winter of 1925, Mao Zedong proposed that China’s social structure exhibited the characteristic of “small at both ends, large in the middle.” He analyzed the two opposing political “united fronts” at that time—the “counter-revolutionary united front” composed of the landlord class and the comprador class, and the “revolutionary united front” composed of the “petty bourgeoisie (owner-peasants, small merchants, handicraft masters), semi-proletariat (semi-owner-peasants, tenant peasants, handicraft workers, shop assistants, peddlers), and proletariat (industrial workers, coolies, farm laborers, lumpen-proletariat).” He also analyzed the vacillating “middle bourgeoisie (small landlords, small bankers and moneylenders, dealers in domestic goods, owners of Chinese-owned factories)” between the two fronts. The revolutionary stance and revolutionary trends of the “middle bourgeoisie” profoundly affected the revolutionary enthusiasm of other classes, especially the peasant class. Therefore, how to unite the “middle bourgeoisie” was a very important issue for the Chinese Communists at that time. Thereafter, the CPC began at the strategic level to consciously respond to the interests and demands of various social classes and strata, especially fully considering and implementing the interests of the “middle bourgeoisie” on the issue of land distribution, gradually incorporating them into the category of revolutionary subjects, meaning that political identity historically became an important component of the CPC’s people-centered thought system.

1925 年冬，毛泽东提出，中国社会结构呈现“两头小，中间大”的特征，他分析了当时中国两大对立的政治“联合战线”——由地主阶级和买办阶级组成的“反革命联合战线”，以及由“小资产阶级（自耕农、小商、手工业主），半无产阶级（半自耕农、佃农、手工业工人、店员、小贩），无产阶级（产业工人、苦力、雇农、游民无产阶级）”组成的“革命的联合战线”，同时还分析了介于两个战线中间摇摆不定的“中产阶级（小地主、小银行家及钱庄主、国货商、华资工厂主）”。而“中产阶级”的革命立场与革命动向深刻牵动着其他阶级，特别是农民阶级的革命积极性。因此，如何团结“中产阶级”对当时的中国共产党人而言是十分重要的问题。此后，中国共产党在策略层面开始有意识地回应社会各阶级阶层的利益诉求，尤其是在土地分配问题上充分考量和落实“中产阶级”的利益，逐渐将他们纳入革命主体范畴，意味着政治身份认同历史地成为中国共产党人民主体思想体系的重要组成。

(2) The Dual Superimposition of Economic Conditions and Changes in the Political Situation Forming the Source of Revolutionary Motivation

（二）经济状况与时局变化双重叠加形成革命动力源

From 1931 to 1936, China’s rural economy had fallen into a comprehensive crisis. Japan gradually controlled the economic lifeline of North China through the Tanggu Truce [1]1 The Tanggu Truce, signed in May 1933, was an armistice between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan that effectively ceded control of Rehe Province and parts of Hebei Province to Japan., the He-Umezu Agreement [2]2 The He-Umezu Agreement, signed in June 1935, was a secret accord between the Chinese Nationalist government and Japan that further expanded Japanese control over North China., and others. In 1935 alone, smuggled goods reached 200 million yuan, destroying the domestic market on which national industry relied for survival. This simultaneous advancement of economic colonization and military aggression caused the survival crisis of all classes to break through the boundaries of traditional class interests. With the full outbreak of the War of Resistance Against Japan in 1937, the resonance effect of the national crisis and economic hardship profoundly restructured China’s social structure and further strengthened the overall revolutionary will of society. This was the dialectical unity of national interests and the people’s subject status under specific historical circumstances.

1931 年至1936年间，中国农村经济已陷入全面危机。日本通过《塘沽协定》《何梅协定》等逐步控制华北经济命脉，仅1935年走私货物就达2亿元，摧毁了民族工业赖以生存的国内市场。这种经济殖民化与军事侵略的同步推进，使各阶级生存危机突破了传统阶级利益边界。随着1937年抗日战争全面爆发，民族危机与经济困境的共振效应深刻重构了中国社会结构，且进一步强化了社会整体革命意愿。这是民族利益与人民主体地位在特定历史情境下的辩证统一。

The intensification of ethnic contradictions and the collapse of the economic base formed a dual driving force for revolutionary mobilization, mainly manifested in three aspects. First, economic oppression compelled the bourgeoisie to adjust their political choices. Taking the “Fujian Incident” [3]3 The Fujian Incident (1933-1934): A rebellion by the 19th Route Army and local leaders in Fujian Province against Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist government, which briefly established a “People’s Revolutionary Government” and sought an alliance with the Chinese Communist Party against Japan. as an example, fiscal difficulties combined with Chiang Kai-shek’s policy of suspending military pay prompted Chen Mingshu and others to turn to uniting with the CPC and resisting Japan in search of an economic way out. Although the CPC missed the opportunity for cooperation due to the “lower-level united front” [4]4 The “lower-level united front” strategy: A Comintern-influenced policy in the early 1930s that prioritized mobilizing the lower classes (workers and peasants) against the upper classes, rejecting alliances with the national bourgeoisie and other intermediate strata. strategy, it thereby recognized: when imperialist economic plunder directly threatened the fiscal and tax base of local strongmen, even warlord cliques could become revolutionary. Second, the collapse of the national economy reshaped the model of social mobilization. Severe inflation forced the CPC to embed “improving people’s livelihood” into the anti-Japanese program: in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region, the implementation of a progressive tax system reduced the burden on poor peasants by 25%; in the Jin-Cha-Ji Border Region, the “25% rent reduction” lowered the land rent rate from 50% to 37.5%. This adjustment in economic policy both maintained the framework of the united front and ensured the continuity of class mobilization. Third, Japan’s “using war to sustain war” policy intensified ethnic contradictions in the economic sphere. The colonial economic system also drew the comprador class into the chain of plunder, leading to a surge in market share conflicts between the Jiangsu-Zhejiang financial clique and Japanese enterprises in China. Mao Zedong pointed out that the phenomenon of “the disunity within the landlord-comprador camp” was essentially a projection of the struggle among imperialist economic spheres of influence within China’s ruling groups.

民族矛盾的激化与经济基础的瓦解形成了革命动员的双重动力源，主要体现在三个方面。首先，经济压迫迫使资产阶级调整政治选择。以“福建事变”为例，财政困境与蒋介石停发军饷的政策相叠加，促使陈铭枢等转向联共抗日寻求经济出路。中国共产党虽因“下层统一战线”策略错失合作良机，但由此认识到：当帝国主义经济掠夺直接威胁到地方实力派的财税基础时，即便军阀集团也会产生革命化可能。其次，国民经济崩溃重塑了社会动员模式。严重的通货膨胀迫使中国共产党将“改善民生”嵌入抗日纲领：在陕甘宁边区推行累进税制使贫农负担下降25%；晋察冀的“二五减租”使地租率从50%降至37.5%。这种经济政策调整既维持了统一战线框架，又确保了阶级动员的持续性。再者，日本“以战养战”政策激化了经济领域的民族矛盾。殖民经济体系将买办阶级也纳入被掠夺链条，导致江浙财团与日本在华企业的市场份额冲突激增。毛泽东指出，“地主买办营垒不统一”现象，本质是帝国主义经济势力范围争夺在中国统治集团内部的投射。

The dual crisis of economy and politics provided the Anti-Japanese National United Front with a supra-class material foundation. The contrast in economic governance capacity between the Kuomintang and the CPC transformed the “people-centered thought” from a political concept into a perceptible mechanism for the redistribution of material interests. The formation of a nationwide consensus that “resistance to Japan is above all else” on the war issue not only gained supra-class legitimacy ideologically but also achieved the dialectical unity of unity and independence, and of national struggle and class struggle, at the level of organizational mobilization. The people-centered thought began to play an important role as part of the CPC’s top-level design.

经济与政治的双重危机使抗日民族统一战线获得了超阶级的物质支撑。而国共双方在经济治理能力上的反差，使“人民主体思想”从政治理念转化为可感知的物质利益再分配机制。在战争问题上形成全民族“抗日高于一切”的共识，既从意识形态上获得了超阶级的合法性地位，又在组织动员层面上实现了统一性和独立性、民族斗争和阶级斗争的辩证统一，人民主体思想开始作为中国共产党顶层设计的一部分发挥重要作用。

(III) The Dual Recognition Mechanism Implicit in the Political Integration of “Each Getting Its Due”

（三）“各得其所”政治整合蕴含的双重承认机制

Mao Zedong clearly stated in *On New Democracy*: “The Chinese proletariat, the peasantry, the intellectuals and the other sections of the petty bourgeoisie are the basic forces that determine the destiny of the country.” [5]5 Mao Zedong, *Selected Works of Mao Zedong*, Vol. 2, p. 674. Under the leadership of the working class, these classes must each get their due in order to build a revolutionary society of the Three People’s Principles. Because “if the policies of any political party do not take into account the interests of these classes, if the people of these classes do not get their due, if the people of these classes have no right to speak, it is impossible to manage state affairs well.” [6]6 Mao Zedong, *Selected Works of Mao Zedong*, Vol. 2, p. 766. To grasp the various social strata and groups during the war, Mao Zedong advocated that all sides must make mutual concessions to a certain extent in economic policy, land distribution, and democratic rights. Thus, the political integration of “each getting its due” contains a dual recognition mechanism: recognition of class identity and recognition of political rights.

毛泽东在《新民主主义论》中明确指出：“中国无产阶级、农民、知识分子和其他小资产阶级，乃是决定国家命运的基本势力。”这些阶级在工人阶级领导之下，必须各得其所，才能建设一个革命的三民主义的社会。因为“任何政党的政策如果不顾到这些阶级的利益，如果这些阶级的人们不得其所，如果这些阶级的人们没有说话的权利，要想把国事弄好是不可能的”。为在战争中把握住社会各阶层群体，毛泽东主张各方须在一定程度上经济政策、土地分配以及民主权利等方面相互让步。由此，“各得其所”的政治整合蕴含着承认阶级身份与承认政治权利的双重承认机制。

On the one hand, a series of policy measures such as rent and interest reduction were used to enable peasants to obtain means of production and adjust their economic status. “Distribute the land of the landlord class to the peasants, while preserving ordinary private capitalist enterprises and not abolishing the rich peasant economy,” [7]7 Mao Zedong, *Selected Works of Mao Zedong*, Vol. 2, p. 678. changing the policy of “land to the tiller” to one of peasants reducing rent and interest and landlords paying rent and interest, so that peasants have food to eat and landlords can also get by. In labor-capital relations, “do not confiscate other capitalist private property, do not prohibit the development of capitalist production that does not ‘manipulate the people’s livelihood,’” [8]8 Mao Zedong, *Selected Works of Mao Zedong*, Vol. 2, p. 678. but rather “call on Shanghai capitalists to set up industries in northern Jiangsu,” [9]9 Mao Zedong, *Selected Works of Mao Zedong*, Vol. 2, p. 768. “allow the liberalist ideology of the national bourgeoisie to exist, and allow liberalist cultural figures and educators to run newspapers and schools.” [10]10 Mao Zedong, *Selected Works of Mao Zedong*, Vol. 2, p. 768. Through land reform, the “revolutionary subject” status of workers and peasants was established; the number of landlord households in the border regions decreased by one-third compared to before the war, with their proportion dropping from 3.6% to 2.4% in 1945, and the identities of each class were recognized. On the other hand, to broadly grant political rights and expand political participation, the “Three-Thirds System” [11]11 The Three-Thirds System: A policy in the CPC’s anti-Japanese base areas during the War of Resistance (1937-1945) where, in local governments, one-third of the positions were held by Communists, one-third by non-Party leftists, and one-third by centrists (including landlords and capitalists). was implemented in the form of political power organization, retaining the right of landlords to participate in political discussion. In a 1940 directive on the class essence of anti-Japanese democratic political power, it was clearly stated that the political power in the enemy’s rear was, in class essence, the political power of the workers, peasants, and petty bourgeoisie. Compared to the Soviet period’s “deprivation of the exploiting classes’ right to vote,” this further expanded the scope of political subjects institutionally, providing an institutional guarantee for the establishment of the Anti-Japanese National United Front.

一方面，利用减租减息等一系列政策手段使农民获得生产资料，调整其经济地位。“把地主阶级的土地分配给农民所有，同时保存一般的私人资本主义的企业，并不废除富农经济”，将“耕者有其田”的政策，改为农民减租减息、地主交租交息，这样一来，农民有饭吃，地主也能过活。在劳资关系上，“并不没收其他资本主义的私有财产，并不禁止‘不操纵国民生计’的资本主义生产的发展”，而是“号召上海资本家到苏北办实业”，“容许民族资产阶级的自由主义思想存在，容许自由主义的文化人及教育家办报办学”。通过土地改革确立工农的“革命主体”地位，边区地主的户数比战前减少三分之一，比例从3.6%降至1945年的2.4%，各阶级身份获得承认。另一方面，为广泛赋予政治权利，扩大政治参与度，在政权组织形式上实行“三三制”，保留地主议政权利。在1940年关于抗日民主政权的阶级实质问题的指示中明确敌后政权在阶级实质上是工农小资产阶级的政权，相较于苏维埃时期“剥夺剥削者选举权”，在制度上进一步扩大了政治主体范围，为建立抗日民族统一战线提供了制度保障。

Through the operation of the dual recognition mechanism, the CPC shaped a new type of political community during the New Democratic Revolution period—the Anti-Japanese National United Front—successfully achieving a shift in the subject from “class revolution” to “national revolution”: while maintaining the foundational status of the working and peasant classes, the poor and hired peasants gradually decreased in class relations, while rich peasants and middle peasants became the main class components of the border regions. This subject-shaping strategy of “both transforming and including” enabled all anti-Japanese people to stand in their respective positions and ultimately formed the “greatest common divisor” of the revolutionary subject.

通过双重承认机制的运作，中国共产党塑造了新民主主义革命时期的新型政治共同体——抗日民族统一战线，成功实现了从“阶级革命”到“民族革命”的主体转换：在保持工农阶级基础地位的同时，在阶级关系上贫雇农逐渐减少，而富农中农则成为边区主要的阶级成分。这种“既改造又包容”的主体形塑策略，使得所有抗日人民都站在各自应有的岗位上，并最终形成革命主体的“最大公约数”。

Starting from the need for political identity and the goal of integrating social subjects, the Chinese Communists keenly grasped the structural characteristic of Chinese society as “small at both ends, large in the middle,” [12]12 “Small at both ends, large in the middle”: A description of Chinese class structure, meaning the proletariat and the big bourgeoisie were small in number, while the intermediate classes (peasants, petty bourgeoisie, national bourgeoisie) were large. clarifying the extension of the people’s subject at that time. As Mao Zedong said, the inevitable connection between revolutionary war and the masses determined that only by mobilizing and relying on the masses could war be waged, and also determined that the Party’s working method principle must take the interests of the masses as the foundation, gradually establishing a mobilization mechanism with “each getting its due” as the core value principle. It was necessary both to guarantee the economic rights needed for the survival of the masses under special historical conditions, to consolidate revolutionary forces by solving specific problems in the masses’ production and life, and especially to satisfy the interest demands of different class and stratum groups in order to maintain social fairness and justice. It was also necessary to follow this value consensus, complete national independence, achieve national unification, establish a democratic political power, and guarantee the basic political rights of the people’s subject. The realization of the people-centered status in Chinese-path modernization thereby exhibited the simultaneity and unity of the political subject and the economic subject. This explains why “each getting its due” could become the value principle and practical goal of the Party’s people-centered thought during the New Democratic Revolution period, greatly mobilizing the broadest democratic groups and ordinary people, completing the rapid integration of political forces across all social classes and strata, and gaining political identity on a nationwide scale.

从政治认同需求和整合社会主体的目的出发，中国共产党人敏锐把握中国社会“两头小，中间大”的结构特征，廓清了当时人民主体的外延。正如毛泽东所说，革命战争与群众之间的必然联系，决定了只有动员和依靠群众才能进行战争，也决定了党的工作方法原则必须以群众利益为根本，逐步确立了以“各得其所”为核心价值原则的动员机制。既要在特殊历史条件下保障人民群众生存所需的经济权利，通过解决群众生产和生活中的具体问题来凝聚革命力量，特别是满足不同阶级阶层群体的利益诉求，以维护社会公平正义。又须遵循这一价值共识，完成民族独立，实现国家统一，建立民主政权，保障人民主体的基本政治权利。中国式现代化人民主体地位的实现由此呈现出政治主体与经济主体的同步性和统一性。这就解释了为何“各得其所”能成为新民主主义革命时期党的人民主体思想的价值原则和实践目标，极大地动员起了最广泛的民主团体和普通民众，完成了对社会各阶级阶层政治力量的迅速整合，并取得全民族范围内的政治认同。

II. Institutional Construction: “Common Prosperity” as a Modernization Goal to Consolidate the Economic Subject

二、制度建构：“共同富裕”作为现代化目标凝聚经济主体

Marx pointed out that socialist society must “re-establish individual property on the basis of the achievements of the capitalist era, on the basis of cooperation and the common possession of the land and of the means of production produced by labor itself.” [13]13 Karl Marx, *Capital*, Vol. 1, Chapter 32. This re-establishment of property is obviously not a subjective conjecture, but is premised and based on the natural development of productive forces. Promoting the development of productive forces is the material foundation for escaping poverty and thereby achieving common prosperity. In the 1950s, Mao Zedong clearly stated in *On the Question of Agricultural Cooperation* that the broad masses of peasants could achieve common prosperity only under socialism, thereby establishing the keynote of “common prosperity” as an essential requirement and distinctive feature of socialism with Chinese characteristics. The establishment of public ownership laid the institutional foundation for consolidating the economic subject under the guidance of “common prosperity,” and also provided the institutional foundation for the Party and government to adjust the overall thinking of social development after reform and opening up—shifting from integrating social classes for the purpose of political mobilization under the discourse system of revolution to mobilizing the initiative of the people’s subject through material interests under market orientation.

马克思指出，社会主义社会要“在资本主义时代的成就的基础上，在协作和对土地及靠劳动本身生产的生产资料的共同占有的基础上，重新建立个人所有制”。这种所有制的重建显然不是一种主观臆断，而是以生产力自然发展为基础和前提的。促进生产力的发展是摆脱贫困，进而实现共同富裕的物质基础。20世纪50年代，毛泽东就在《关于农业合作化问题》中明确表明广大农民要实现共同富裕，只有在社会主义才能实现，并由此奠定了“共同富裕”作为中国特色社会主义本质要求和显著特征的基调。而公有制的确立为凝聚“共同富裕”主导下的经济主体奠定了制度基础，也为改革开放以后，党和政府调整社会发展总体思路——由革命话语体系下以政治动员为目的整合社会阶级，转向市场导向下以物质利益调动人民主体积极性提供了制度基础。

(I) “Common Prosperity” Opens the Wind of Thought to Adapt to New Economic Development Needs

（一）“共同富裕”为适应经济发展新需求开思想之风

In the early period of reform and opening up, the Chinese Communists with Comrade Deng Xiaoping as their chief representative increasingly realized that the masses’ labor enthusiasm was closely linked to the material benefits they obtained, and that the Party and government urgently needed to explore a new economic development model capable of optimizing the allocation of social resources and effectively raising the people’s income levels. To achieve the goal of “common prosperity,” the Party Central Committee thus initiated an economic mobilization strategy that would last half a century — “allowing some people, some regions, and some enterprises to become prosperous first” — intending to use their exemplary power to drive the entire national economy forward in a wave-like manner. The famous “Southern Tour Talks” [14]14 The Southern Tour Talks refer to a series of speeches delivered by Deng Xiaoping during his inspection tour of southern China (Wuhan, Shenzhen, Zhuhai, Shanghai, etc.) in early 1992, which reaffirmed the direction of reform and opening up and market-oriented economic reforms. were brewed in this context to stimulate the market economy. The Party’s people-centered thought, or what might be called its view of the people, was further deepened and developed in response to the changing times.

改革开放初期，以邓小平同志为主要代表的中国共产党人愈发意识到，人民群众的劳动积极性与其获得的物质利益息息相关，党和政府亟须探索新的经济发展模式，使之能够优化社会资源配置，切实提高人民收入水平。为实现“共同富裕”的目标，党中央由此开启了长达半个世纪的经济动员策略——“允许一部分人、一部分地区和企业先富起来”，意在通过他们的示范力量带动整个国民经济不断波浪式向前发展。著名的“南方谈话”就是在这种背景下为刺激市场经济酝酿而成。党的人民主体思想，或可说人民观，在顺应时势中进一步深化发展。

First, in terms of development goals and value principles, “common prosperity” further consolidated the legitimacy foundation of China’s socialist system. The masses, as the real subjective objects, have their material living conditions guaranteed as the premise and foundation of freedom at the level of the political state. The “nothingness” of the proletariat is not “having nothing,” but a “nothingness” that transcends “having” — it is having and not having, that is, after the immense abundance of material wealth, the true possession of the means of production by human beings. Starting from the essential connotation of human beings, material scarcity and poverty are themselves not socialism. China in the early period of reform and opening up was in the primary stage of socialism, inevitably retaining various pre-socialist modes of production, while also needing to achieve the modernization and marketization of material production in a relatively short time, catching up with and even surpassing the industrialization process of Western countries. Therefore, the superiority of the socialist system with Chinese characteristics during this period was manifested in the universal growth of social wealth and the universal improvement of productive forces.

首先，在发展目标和价值原则上，“共同富裕”进一步夯实了我国社会主义制度的合法性基础。人民群众作为现实的主体对象，保障其物质生活条件是政治国家层面自由的前提和基础，无产阶级的“无”不是“没有”，而是一种超越“有”之后的“无”，是无有无不有——是在物质财富极大丰富之后，人对于生产资料的真正占有。从人的本质内涵出发，物质匮乏和贫穷本身并非社会主义。改革开放初期的中国处于社会主义初级阶段，不可避免地保留了前社会主义的各种生产方式，又要在较短时间内实现物质生产的现代化和市场化，追赶甚至超越西方国家的工业化进程。因此，这一时期中国特色社会主义制度的优越性就体现在社会财富的普遍增长和生产力的普遍提高上。

Second, in terms of social mobilization strategy, “allowing some people to become prosperous first” greatly stimulated the autonomy, initiative, and creativity of the people as subjects. In the process where individuals gradually replaced enterprises as the rising economic subjects, and corporate rationality was deconstructed by individual rationality, “the center of economic issues will no longer be the relationship between enterprises and government concealed by the so-called relationship between market and government, but the relationship between individuals.” The socialist market economy system emphasizes viewing material wealth growth according to labor contribution and ability, overturning the traditional small-peasant value concept widely held by people at the beginning of reform and opening up — “fearing scarcity rather than inequality.” It broke the ideological debates at the level of ownership that existed in the preceding historical stage, and many Chinese people began to actively view and engage in the market economy. This created opportunities for labor groups with the ability to lead in becoming prosperous. Under the universal care of social group psychology, and while adhering to the principles of wholeness and synergy in terms of goals, it developed multiple forms of ownership under the premise of public ownership as the mainstay, becoming a realistic path to resolve the principal contradiction in Chinese society at that time.

其次，在社会动员策略层面，“允许一部分人先富起来”极大地激发了人民主体的自主性、能动性、创造性。在个体逐渐取代企业作为经济主体而崛起，公司理性被个人理性所解构的过程中，“经济问题的中心，将不再是所谓的市场与政府的关系掩盖下的企业与政府的关系，而是个人与个人的关系”。社会主义市场经济体制强调按劳动贡献和能力大小来看待物质财富增长，颠覆了改革开放之初人们普遍抱有“不患寡而患不均”的传统小农价值观念。打破了前序历史阶段在所有制层面存在的意识形态争论，许多国人开始积极看待和投入市场经济。这就为有带头致富能力的劳动群体创造了机遇，在社会群体心理的普遍关照下，又在目标原则上坚持整体性、协同性，在以公有制为主体前提下，发展出了多种所有制经济形式，成为了解决当时我国社会主要矛盾的现实路径。

Finally, in terms of basic relations between people, common prosperity prophetically responded to the question of how to view the gap between social rich and poor. Inequality and unfairness are completely different concepts. “Inequality” is an objective difference in the possession of resources, the cause of which may be objective differences among individual laborers in knowledge and skills, or regional differences in location, etc. “Unfairness,” on the other hand, judges the reasonableness of resource distribution from the perspective of values, and solutions are often sought at the level of institutional structure. The vigorous development of the market economy inevitably creates differences in the degree and sequence of obtaining and growing material wealth. In the process of exploring the socialist market economy system, the Party and government realized that capital flow cannot be absolutely homogenized, and it is necessary to distinguish between the issues of becoming prosperous first and becoming prosperous later in socialist development. The Party and government are committed to creating and exploring a more ideal social system — a path to poverty alleviation and prosperity that takes common prosperity as its development goal, allows for objective differences in speed and sequence during the development process, and balances fairness and efficiency. This is a process that unifies history and logic. Adhering to the people’s principal position in the new historical period is a process of the CPC’s increasing theoretical maturity, and it also laid the ideological foundation for various institutional arrangements in the later period.

最后，在人与人的基本关系方面，共同富裕预见性地回应了如何看待社会贫富差距的问题。不均等与不公平是完全不同的概念，“不均等”是资源占有的客观差异，导致这种差异的原因可能是劳动者个体之间在知识、技能方面的客观差异，又或者是地域之间的区位差异等。而“不公平”是从价值观层面评判资源分布的合理与否，往往要从制度结构层面寻找解决途径。而市场经济的蓬勃发展，不可避免地会造成物质财富获得和增长的程度差异和先后之别。党和政府在探索社会主义市场经济体制的过程中，意识到了资本流动不可能绝对均质化，必须区别看待社会主义发展中先富和后富的问题。党和政府致力于开创和探索一个更理想的社会制度体系——一个以共同富裕为发展目标，允许发展过程中存在客观上的先后快慢问题，兼顾公平与效率的脱贫致富之路。这是一个历史与逻辑相统一的过程，在新的历史时期坚持人民主体地位不动摇是中国共产党在理论上愈发成熟的过程，也为后期各种制度安排奠定了思想基础。

(II) Adjustment of the National Economic Structure and the Emergence of New Economic Subjects in Response to the Times

（二）国民经济结构调整全新经济主体应时而生

The movement of products in the sense of Marxist political economy essentially studies the economic relations between people hidden behind it. Since the 1950s, China inevitably experienced urban economic crises brought about by attracting foreign investment, and the resulting urban-rural dual structural contradiction was a cost transfer of an inward-oriented system with Chinese characteristics, thus differing from Western countries’ industrialization, which transfers costs outward. In the early period of reform and opening up, facing a relatively passive situation with absolute capital scarcity, and starting from the actual national conditions of the primary stage of socialism, China could only choose “opening up to the outside world” to attract foreign capital, and internal reform — abolishing the ownership relations of complete public ownership of the national economy, allowing, encouraging, and supporting the development of the non-public sector, to adapt to the necessary capital accumulation process in industrial development.

马克思主义政治经济学意义上的产品运动，实质上研究的是其背后隐藏的人与人的经济关系。自20世纪50年代以来，中国不可避免地出现了由对外引资带来的城市经济危机，所造成的城乡二元结构矛盾乃是具有中国特色的内向型制度成本转嫁，因而不同于西方国家工业化是向外转嫁成本。改革开放初期，面对相对被动的、资本绝对稀缺条件，从社会主义初级阶段的现实国情出发，中国只能选择“对外开放”以吸引外资，对内改革——革除国民经济全盘公有的所有制关系，允许并鼓励、支持非公有制经济发展，以适应工业化发展中必经的资本积累过程。

On the one hand, the commodity economy rapidly expanded in cities. In 1981, the government allowed returned educated youth to “set up stalls” to engage in the individual economy. After 1992, a large influx of foreign capital followed, and with it the vigorous development of “three types of foreign-invested enterprises” [15]15 “Three types of foreign-invested enterprises” (三资企业) refers to Sino-foreign equity joint ventures, Sino-foreign contractual joint ventures, and wholly foreign-owned enterprises established in China. showed a trend of “moving north and west.” On the other hand, the structure of Chinese society began to shift from a dual urban-rural structure to a tripartite structure, with the emergence of a rural industrial sector. A large number of capable people who became prosperous emerged, and township enterprises rose, accelerating the flow of rural labor from the agricultural sector to non-agricultural sectors. However, at this time, the urban-rural household registration policy had not yet been relaxed, and the flow of the primary industry population to the secondary and tertiary industries was not significant. It was not until the 1990s that the state introduced policies encouraging farmers to work in cities, which rapidly promoted the transfer of surplus rural labor to cities and towns. At the same time, it also formed informal sectors in urban economies and urban employment, thereby creating a new type of urban-rural quadruple structure. It was precisely this dynamic process that enabled China to achieve the integration of urban and rural areas and the integration of social structure in the course of its ultra-large-scale urbanization.

一方面，商品经济在城市迅速推开。1981年政府允许返乡知青“摆摊设点”搞个体经济，到1992年以后大量外资涌入，随之而来的是“三资”企业蓬勃发展出现“北上西进”的趋势。另一方面，中国社会的结构开始从城乡二元结构转变为三元结构，出现了农村工业板块。一些致富能人大量涌现，乡镇企业崛起，加速了农村劳动力从农业部门向非农业部门流动转移。但此时的城乡户籍政策尚未松动，第一产业人口向第二、第三产业的流动并不显著。直到20世纪90年代，国家出台鼓励农民进城务工政策，迅速促进农村剩余劳动力向城镇转移。同时也形成了城镇经济和城镇就业的非正规部门，由此造就了新型城乡四元结构。正是这一动态过程，使得中国能够在超大规模的城镇化历程中，实现城乡一体化和社会结构一体化整合。

Along with economic and social development and the implementation of a series of policy adjustments, the extension of the people as the subject in our country underwent historic changes during this period. From the perspective of the functional classification in the official discourse system, there are mainly the following four types of identity groups. First, the labor subjects under traditional agricultural society (including workers, peasants, cadres, etc., among the intellectuals) transformed into diversified market subjects under the modern industrial society system, and together with the “new workers” and “new peasants” groups that emerged with the development of the modern urban-rural industrial system, they formed the “totality of socialist laborers.” Second, during the early germination and development of our country’s market economy, a group that obtained dual “economic-political” elite status due to their exceptional ability to lead others to wealth. They were continuously incorporated into the Party’s organizational structure, deeply participated in grassroots social management, and enhanced the Party’s effectiveness in grassroots governance. In a sense, they broke the traditional binary structure of “officials and commoners” in China, demonstrating the structural flexibility of modern society. Third, the new social strata that continuously emerged with marketization, primarily composed of individuals in the non-public sector of the economy and intellectuals with free-choice employment, concentrated in new economic organizations and new social organizations, constituting the “builders of the socialist cause.” As important economic and technological groups in the new era, the Party and government actively affirmed and recognized their social identities, enabling them to integrate with the existing identity system to adapt to new economic development trends. More importantly, their growth and expansion balanced the middle groups of the social structural system—the proportion of economic elites and technological elites increased significantly. Fourth, the “patriots who support socialism” and the “patriots who support the reunification of the motherland,” composed of domestic laborers and builders who are “representatives of non-Party figures” supporting socialism, as well as patriotic individuals among compatriots in Hong Kong, Macao, Taiwan, and overseas Chinese who support the reunification of the motherland. In addition, with the continuous differentiation of the social structure, the income gap has a tendency to gradually widen, to a certain extent causing the marginalization of low-income groups. Although the state has slowed or even narrowed the growth of the gap through a series of policy interventions, due to their large numbers, they are increasingly becoming a key factor in the stability of our country’s social system and structure today.

伴随经济社会发展和一系列政策调整落实，我国人民主体外延在这一时期发生了历史性变化。从官方话语体系的功能分类来看主要有以下四类身份群体。第一，传统农业社会下的劳动主体（包括知识分子在内的工人、农民、干部等）转向现代化工业社会体系下的多元化市场主体，并与伴随现代化城乡工业体系发展而出现的“新工人”“新农民”群体共同组成的“全体社会主义劳动者”。第二，在我国市场经济萌芽发育初期，因超强的带头致富能力获得“经济—政治”双重精英身份的群体。他们不断被纳入党的组织架构中，深度参与基层社会管理，增强党的基层治理效能。从某种意义上讲，他们打破了中国传统“官民社会”的二元架构，彰显出现代社会的结构弹性。第三，伴随市场化不断涌现的以非公有制经济人士和自由择业知识分子为主体，集中于新的经济组织和新的社会组织中的新的社会阶层，构成的“社会主义事业的建设者”。作为新时期发展的重要经济群体和技术群体，党和政府积极肯定和承认他们的社会身份，使之能够与既有身份体系接轨，以适应新的经济发展趋势。更重要的是，他们的发展壮大平衡了社会结构体系的中间群体——经济精英和技术精英的比重显著提高。第四，以国内劳动者、建设者中拥护社会主义的“党外人士代表”，以及港澳台和各国侨胞中拥护祖国统一的爱国人士，构成的“拥护社会主义的爱国者”和“拥护祖国统一的爱国者”。除此以外，随着社会结构的不断分化，收入差距有逐步扩大的趋势，一定程度造成了低收入群体的边缘化，虽然国家通过一系列政策干预使得差距增速放缓甚至缩小，但因其数量庞大而越来越成为今天我国社会制度结构稳定与否的关键性因素。

These entirely new social subjects that emerged with the development of the market economy not only gained economic affirmation and recognition, being regarded as a positive force for the development of the socialist cause, but also became indispensable basic subjects for China’s transformation from a “土字-shaped” social structure to an “olive-shaped” social structure. [16]16 The “土字-shaped” social structure refers to a social hierarchy shaped like the Chinese character “土” (earth), characterized by a large lower class and a small upper class, while the “olive-shaped” structure refers to a society with a large middle class and smaller upper and lower classes, often seen as a goal of social stability.

这些伴随市场经济发展起来的全新社会主体，不仅获得了经济上的肯定和认同，被视为社会主义事业发展的积极力量，更成为了中国由“土字型”社会结构向“橄榄型”社会结构转型不可或缺的基本主体。

(3) Dynamic Balance between Efficiency and Fairness: Perfecting the Distribution System Based on a Triple Coordination Path

（三）效率与公平动态平衡：基于三重协调路径完善分配制度

Marx pointed out: “Distribution relations themselves are produced by relations of production, and they represent the same relations of production from a different perspective.” [17]17 This is a paraphrase of Marx’s argument in *Capital*, Volume 3, Chapter 51, on distribution relations. Social stratification theory holds that the income distribution structure primarily reflects the issue of structural equality in society from the perspective of the degree of possession of wealth resources. Merely possessing material wealth is not the essential connotation of the people as the subject; equal enjoyment of the right to produce and create material wealth, and the sharing of the entire society’s wealth by the people, are the foundation for realizing the economic status of the people as the subject. However, to ensure that economic and social development and the reasonable distribution of residents’ income are mutually prerequisite, rather than being split into two unrelated “separate sheets,” it is necessary to urge the development of productive forces and the rapid accumulation of material wealth, while simultaneously designing a mature and complete distribution system that balances efficiency and fairness.

马克思指出：“分配关系本身是由生产关系产生的，并且是从另一个角度表现的生产关系本身。”社会分层理论则认为，收入分配结构主要是从财富资源占有程度反映了社会结构性平等的问题。单纯占有物质财富并不是人民主体的本质内涵，平等享有生产和创造物质财富的权利，以及全社会财富由人民共享才是实现人民主体经济地位的根本。但要让经济社会发展与居民收入合理分配互为前提，而非割裂成不相关的“两张皮”，就必须在敦促生产力发展，物质财富迅速累积的同时，通过设计成熟完善的分配制度兼顾效率与公平。

In the process of constructing a distribution system of “dynamic balance between efficiency and fairness,” our country still faces three structural contradictions: in the primary distribution field, the share of labor remuneration is lower than the international level (GDP is 1,234,029.4 billion yuan, and labor remuneration in domestic non-financial transaction fund use is 634,040.86 billion yuan, accounting for 51.3% of GDP); the expansion of capital factor returns has led to the solidification of the “capital strong, labor weak” pattern; in the redistribution link, the proportion of direct taxes is insufficient (in 2023, individual income tax accounted for 7.2% of total tax revenue, and the lack of property taxes exacerbates the intergenerational transmission of poverty); the scale of the third distribution only accounts for 0.2% of GDP, and incentive tools such as charitable trust tax preferences urgently need improvement. These issues cause the flow of social wealth to exhibit a “Matthew effect.” [18]18 The “Matthew effect” is a term derived from the Gospel of Matthew, used in sociology to describe the phenomenon where “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.”

我国在构建“效率与公平动态平衡”分配体系过程中仍面临三重结构性矛盾：初次分配领域劳动报酬占比低于国际水平（国内生产总值为1234029.4亿元，国内非金融交易资金运用劳动者报酬为634040.86亿元，占GDP的比重为51.3%），资本要素收益扩张引发“资强劳弱”格局固化；再分配环节直接税占比不足（2023年个人所得税占税收总收入7.2%，财产性税收缺失加剧代际贫困传递）；第三次分配规模仅占GDP0.2%，慈善信托税收优惠等激励工具亟待完善。这些问题导致社会财富流动呈现“马太效应”。

Facing the deep-seated contradictions in the distribution field, the 20th National Congress of the CPC established the strategic framework of “building a coordinated and supporting institutional system of primary distribution, redistribution, and tertiary distribution.” [19]19 The 20th National Congress of the CPC was held in October 2022, where General Secretary Xi Jinping delivered First, primary distribution strengthens the protection of labor rights and interests. For example, the “Outline of the Strategic Plan for Expanding Domestic Demand” in 2023 clearly states “raising the proportion of labor remuneration in primary distribution”; through the revision of the “Regulations on Minimum Wages,” the baseline is raised to over 50% of the per capita consumption expenditure of local urban residents; regulations on the protection of rights and interests of digital platform workers regulate the distribution order of new forms of employment, etc. Second, redistribution highlights the function of precise regulation. This is fully reflected in aspects such as the dynamic adjustment mechanism of special additional deductions for individual income tax, the expansion of the pilot reform of the real estate tax, and the entry of the inheritance tax legislation into the preparatory review stage. Third, by adding new forms of donations and raising the pre-tax deduction limit for corporate charitable donations, the third distribution is optimized to build an incentive-compatible mechanism.

面对分配领域的深层矛盾，党的二十大确立“构建初次分配、再分配、第三次分配协调配套的制度体系”战略框架。一是初次分配强化劳动权益保障。例如2023年《扩大内需战略规划纲要》明确“提高劳动报酬在初次分配中比重”，通过《最低工资规定》修订将基准线提升至当地城镇居民人均消费支出50%以上；数字平台用工权益保障条例规范新就业形态分配秩序等。二是再分配突出精准调节功能。这一点充分体现在通过个人所得税专项附加扣除标准动态调整机制、房地产税改革试点扩围、遗产税立法进入预备审议阶段等方面。三是通过新增捐赠形态、企业慈善捐赠税前扣除限额提升等优化第三次分配构建激励相容机制。

The innovation of the socialist distribution system with Chinese characteristics has broken through the traditional one-way logic of “production determines distribution,” constructing a virtuous cycle mechanism of “production—distribution—reproduction.” The governance effectiveness of the policy combination has become apparent, avoiding the contradiction between capital exclusively enjoying the residual claim and labor creating value caused by the rapid accumulation of capital in modernization development. It also confirms the institutional advantages of the collaborative governance model of “effective government + efficient market + caring society.” This institutional evolution not only inherits Marx’s classic thesis on “another manifestation of relations of production” but also creatively develops the contemporary Chinese political economy of “promoting common prosperity through high-quality development.” The Party and government continuously deepen the ideological connotation of “common prosperity” at the theoretical level and earnestly fulfill this political commitment in institutional practice, thereby enabling the core concept of the thought on the people as the subject to achieve both consistent and advancing development with the times.

中国特色社会主义分配制度创新突破了传统“生产决定分配”的单向逻辑，构建起“生产—分配—再生产”的良性循环机制。政策组合拳的治理效能显现，避免了因现代化发展资本极速积累而导致的资本独享剩余索取权与劳动创造价值的矛盾。也印证了“有为政府+有效市场+有情社会”协同治理模式的制度优势。这种制度演进既继承了马克思关于“生产关系的另一种表现”的经典论断，更创造性地发展了“在高质量发展中促进共同富裕”的当代中国政治经济学。党和政府在理论层面不断深化“共同富裕”的思想内涵，在制度实践中切实履行这一政治承诺，从而使人民主体思想核心理念获得了一以贯之又与时俱进的发展。

III. Value Sublimation: “Shared Development” as the Top-Level Design of the New Era

三、价值升华：“共享发展”作为新时代的顶层设计

In the context of the New Era, the CPC’s thought on the people as the subject both “upholds the fundamentals” of the Marxist thought on the people as the subject and must inevitably “innovate” continuously according to the changes of the times. As digital technology deeply integrates into socio-economic life, the past “national wealth spiral” driven by demand, investment, and exports, along with the decline of the demographic dividend of labor, is beginning to shift to a “people’s wealth spiral” economic growth model that relies on cloud (cloud computing, big data), network (internet, internet of things), and terminal (smart terminals, software applications) to achieve supply-side reform of domestic consumer demand. Under the digital economy, new business forms, new business models and organizational forms, and new demands give rise to new products and services, new groups, and new values, resulting in a large number of labor groups in new forms of employment. The basic spirit of the internet—open source, inclusiveness, and sharing—cultivates new cultural habits among people. Thus, the core value system of the CPC’s thought on the people as the subject, based on “common prosperity,” has been elevated to “shared development.”

新时代背景下，中国共产党人民主体思想既有对马克思主义人民主体思想的“守正”，又必然要根据时代变化而不断“创新”。当数字技术深度融入社会经济生活，过去以需求、投资、出口为驱动力的“国富螺旋”伴随劳动人口红利下降开始转向依托云（云计算、大数据）、网（互联网、物联网）、端（智能终端、软件应用）实现国内消费需求供给侧改革的“民富螺旋”经济增长模式。数字经济形态下新业态、新商业模式和组织形式、新需求，催生了新产品和服务、新群体以及新价值观念，出现了大量新就业形态劳动者群体。开源、普惠、共享作为互联网基本精神培养了人们新的文化习惯。由此，中国共产党人民主体思想的核心价值体系在“共同富裕”的基础上跃升为“共享发展”。

(1) The Digital Economy as the Driving Force of the “People’s Wealth Spiral” Development Model

（一）数字经济成为“民富螺旋”发展模式驱动力

The past three decades were a golden period of investment-driven “national wealth spirals” that propelled China’s rapid economic development. However, as residents’ income and consumption growth have gradually slowed in recent years and the supply-demand relationship in the labor force has reversed, the traditional “troika” model [20]20 The “troika” model refers to the three drivers of economic growth: investment, consumption, and net exports. can no longer adapt to new economic development needs. At the same time, the “digital economy” has emerged as a modern new agenda in which digital information technology, accompanying a new round of scientific and technological revolution, industrial transformation, and interdisciplinary integration, accelerates its intermingling and penetration with socioeconomic development. This large-scale collaborative body integrates more social resources, takes data as the core factor of production, and deeply integrates knowledge and information with digital technology, causing significant changes in productive forces in both digital industrialization and industrial digitalization. On the one hand, the development of the digital economy can generate a “people’s wealth spiral” of rising incomes, falling prices, and consumption upgrading; the new demands, services, business forms, and consumption patterns it creates help break the limitations of the traditional economic growth model. On the other hand, and more importantly, the changes in relations of production caused by the digital production mode have become a vivid portrayal of the deep integration of technology with labor materials, objects of labor, and laborers, transforming into actual social productive capacity. After sparking three waves of entrepreneurship — “commercialization,” “ecologization,” and “Internet Plus” — China’s digital economy has ushered in a fourth wave, “intelligentization,” which has expanded the boundaries of employment. Digital industrialization and industrial digitalization have not only provided internal driving force for the transformation of China’s social productive forces development but have also, relying on digital technology, promoted the continuous emergence of new models and new forms of business in industries such as transportation, retail, video, education, and healthcare, thereby giving rise to a completely new structure of digital relations of production. These new social relations unfold along the specific logical threads of digital economy production and gradually replace traditional social relations, causing comprehensive development and change in the people as the subject in China.

过去三十年，是投资主导的“国富螺旋”拉动中国经济高速发展的黄金三十年，而随着近年居民收入和消费增长渐趋缓慢，劳动力供求关系逆转，传统的三驾马车模式已经难以适应新的经济发展需求。与此同时，“数字经济”成为了伴随新一轮科技革命、产业变革以及学科交叉融合所出现的数字信息技术与社会经济发展加速交融渗透的一项现代性新议程。这一大规模协作体整合了更多社会资源，以数据作为核心生产要素，知识和信息与数字技术深度融合，引起数字产业化和产业数字化两方面的生产力显著变化。一方面，数字经济的发展能够产生收入提升、物价下降、消费升级的“民富螺旋”，所造成的新需求、新服务、新商业形态、新消费模式有利于破除传统经济增长模式的局限。另一方面，也是更重要的表现，数字生产方式所引起的生产关系的变化，成为了科技与劳动资料、劳动对象以及劳动者深度结合而转化为社会实际生产能力的生动写照。中国数字经济在激发了“商业化”“生态化”“互联网+”三次创业浪潮之后，迎来了第四次浪潮——“智能化”，这带来了就业边界的扩大。数字产业化和产业数字化不仅为中国社会生产力发展转型提供了内驱动力，还依托数字技术，推动了交通、零售、视频、教育、医疗等行业的新模式新业态持续涌现，从而出现了全新的数字生产关系结构。这些新的社会关系遵循数字经济特有的生产逻辑线索而展开，并逐渐替代了传统社会关系，引起了我国人民主体的全面发展变化。

(II) The Historical Expansion of the Category of the People as the Subject in the Era of the Digital Economy

（二）数字经济时代人民主体范畴的历史性拓展

The arrival of the era of the digital economy has profoundly transformed the structure of China’s social subjects. It drives the prosperity of new real economy industries through innovation, spawns a large number of new business forms represented by the electronic information industry, and stimulates immense grassroots innovation. This has become the practical impetus for the Party and government to propose “mass entrepreneurship and innovation” [21]21 “Mass entrepreneurship and innovation” (大众创业，万众创新) is a policy slogan promoted by the Chinese government starting in 2014 to encourage grassroots entrepreneurship and innovation. at the level of institutional design. In the process of the digital economy restructuring social relations of production, the category of the people as the subject in China exhibits four dimensions of evolution. The first category, digital innovation entrepreneurs, as representatives of advanced productive forces, combine information technology capital with business model innovation capabilities. By integrating social resources, they lead the development of the intelligent internet; their particularity lies in the combination of capital operation and innovative thinking, forming the top-level design force of the digital economy. The second category, digital industry professionals, encompasses knowledge elites in fields such as technical R&D and software development, who rise as “tech nouveau riche” by virtue of their professional educational backgrounds and technological innovation capabilities. These two groups have the potential for dynamic conversion between employment and entrepreneurship, and their identity mobility reflects the new mode of existence of human capital in the era of the digital economy. The third category, workers in new forms of employment, constitutes the largest group in terms of numbers, covering service industry mainstays such as couriers, live-streaming hosts, and e-commerce practitioners. Their typical characteristics present structural contradictions such as high occupational mobility, large income fluctuations (lack of fixed social insurance), and lack of skills training (deskilling or single-skilling), reflecting the institutional lag in protecting workers’ rights and interests during the digital transformation of traditional industries. The fourth category, the “new workers” group, serves as the manufacturing-end support for multinational digital enterprises and is essentially a product of urbanization and industrial upgrading. Statistics show that among 260 million migrant workers, those born after 1985 account for 65%. They have left the land but have not fully integrated into cities, forming a unique mode of existence at the end of the digital economy industrial chain.

数字经济时代的到来深刻变革了我国社会主体结构，以创新驱动新实体经济产业繁荣，催生了以电子信息产业为代表的大量新业态，激发了巨大草根创新力。这成为党和政府在制度设计层面提出“大众创业，万众创新”的现实动力。在数字经济重构社会生产关系的进程中，我国人民主体范畴呈现四重演进维度。第一类数字创新创业者作为先进生产力代表，兼具信息技术资本与商业模式创新能力。他们通过整合社会资源引领智能互联网发展，其特殊性在于资本运作与创新思维的结合，形成数字经济顶层设计力量。第二类数字产业专业人员涵盖技术研发、软件开发等领域的知识精英，凭借专业教育背景和技术创新力崛起为“技术新贵”。这两类群体存在就业创业的动态转换可能，其身份流动性折射数字经济时代人力资本的新型存在方式。第三类新就业形态劳动者构成数量最庞大的群体，涵盖快递员、直播主播、电商从业者等服务业主力。其典型特征呈现职业流动性强、收入波动大（无固定社保）、技能培训缺失（去技能化或技能单一化）等结构性矛盾，反映出传统产业数字化转型中劳动者权益保障的制度滞后。第四类“新工人”群体作为跨国数字企业的制造端支撑，本质是城市化与工业升级的产物。统计显示，2.6亿农民工中85后占比达65%，他们脱离土地但未完全融入城市，在数字经济产业链末端形成独特生存样态。

The symbiotic relationship among these four types of subjects constructs a new type of social production network: innovation entrepreneurs build the platform architecture, professionals provide technical support, workers in new business forms realize value transmission, and manufacturing workers complete physical transformation. This layered division-of-labor mechanism shifts the category of the people as the subject from traditional class analysis to functional positioning analysis. In the construction of political discourse, they collectively constitute the contemporary footnote of “strivers for the cause of socialism with Chinese characteristics” — both continuing the classic thesis that “laborers create history” and reshaping the material basis of subjectivity through digital labor. It is worth noting that dynamic conversion is possible among these four groups: professionals can be promoted to entrepreneurs, and new workers can shift to technical positions through skills training. This mobility provides flexible space for social governance in the era of the digital economy but also raises the new proposition of balancing efficiency and fairness.

这四类主体的共生关系构建了新型社会生产网络：创新创业者搭建平台架构，专业人员提供技术支撑，新业态劳动者实现价值传递，制造业工人完成实体转化。这种分层协作机制使人民主体范畴从传统阶级分析转向功能定位分析。在政治话语建构中，他们共同构成“中国特色社会主义事业奋斗者”的时代注脚——既延续“劳动者创造历史”的经典论断，又通过数字劳动重塑了主体性的物质基础。值得注意的是，这四类群体间存在动态转化可能，专业人员可晋升为创业者，新工人通过技能培训转向技术岗位，这种流动性为数字经济时代的社会治理提供了弹性空间，也提出了平衡效率与公平的新命题。

(III) “Shared Development” Becomes the Value Concept for Activating the Autonomy of the People as the Subject

（三）“共享发展”成为激活人民主体自主性的价值理念

Facing the new type of labor relations spawned by the digital economy, the Party promotes the formation of a “data rights confirmation — algorithmic governance — digital human rights” guarantee system: the “Twenty Data Articles” [22]22 The “Twenty Data Articles” (数据二十条) refers to the “Opinions on Building a Data Base System to Better Play the Role of Data Factors,” issued by the CPC Central Committee and the State Council in December 2022, outlining 20 measures for data governance. clarify the principle of tilting data factor income toward laborers, and pilot cities such as Shenzhen have established platform employment rights protection centers. This process of injecting the concepts of “each getting his due” and “shared development” into the construction of digital civilization both continues the institutional wisdom of “land to the tiller” from the Land Revolution period [23]23 The Land Revolution period (1927–1937) was a phase of the Chinese Communist Revolution during which the CPC implemented land redistribution policies, most famously the slogan “land to the tiller” (耕者有其田)., creatively unfolds the current reform of “digital rights to the data holder,” and opens up new realms for the development of the thought on the people as the subject in many new fields.

面对数字经济催生的新型劳动关系，党推动形成“数据确权—算法治理—数字人权”保障体系：《数据二十条》明确数据要素收益向劳动者倾斜原则，深圳等试点城市建立平台用工权益保障中心。这一将“各得其所”“共享发展”理念注入数字文明建构的过程，既延续土地革命时期“耕者有其田”的制度智慧，创造性展开了当前“数者有其权”改革，更在诸多新场域中开辟了人民主体思想的发展新境。

Marx once described a communist community constructed by free people after rational choice. Within this community, differences among members are respected; mutual exchange and mutual assistance among members can perfect individuals themselves; and the authority generated by individuals’ identification with the community is the driving force for the community’s continued development. Today’s China, under the combined effects of industrialization, the market economy, science and technology, and globalization, is undergoing drastic changes in its social structure, and a series of structural institutional problems are intensifying. On the basis of the joint struggle of all the people and the sustainable and sound development of the economy and society, “sharing the fruits of reform and opening up development” has become a new political commitment and vision of the Party Central Committee to the people. In 2015, Xi Jinping clearly stated at a symposium with non-Party personages: “The development we pursue is development that benefits the people; the prosperity we pursue is the common prosperity of all the people. The ultimate criterion for judging whether reform and development are successful is whether the people jointly enjoy the fruits of reform and development.” The Party’s 13th Five-Year Plan [24]24 The 13th Five-Year Plan (2016–2020) was China’s national development plan covering the years 2016–2020. also emphasized, “Sharing is the essential requirement of socialism with Chinese characteristics. We must adhere to development for the people, development relying on the people, and development fruits shared by the people, make more effective institutional arrangements, so that all the people have a greater sense of gain in jointly building and sharing development, enhance development momentum, increase people’s unity, and steadily advance toward common prosperity.”

马克思曾描述自由人在理性选择之后建构起来的共产主义共同体，在这个共同体内尊重成员的差异，成员的相互交流和相互帮助可以完善个体自身，个体对共同体的认同所产生的权威是共同体得以继续发展的动力。今天的中国在工业化、市场经济、科学技术和全球化共同作用下，社会结构剧烈变动，一系列结构性制度问题在加剧。在全体人民共同奋斗、经济社会可持续良好发展的基础上，“共享改革开放的发展成果”已成为党中央对人民群众的新的政治承诺与愿景。2015年，习近平在党外人士座谈会上明确指出：“我们追求的发展是造福人民的发展，我们追求的富裕是全体人民共同富裕。改革发展搞得成功不成功，最终的判断标准是人民是不是共同享受到了改革发展成果。”党的“十三五”规划也强调，“共享是中国特色社会主义的本质要求。必须坚持发展为了人民、发展依靠人民、发展成果由人民共享，作出更有效的制度安排，使全体人民在共建共享发展中有更多获得感，增强发展动力，增进人民团结，朝着共同富裕方向稳步前进”。

Human subjectivity is established on the recognition of one’s own existence and value, meaning that people can govern themselves, determine their own internal manifestations and the external manifestations of their objectified activities. To avoid the possibility that social digitalization might turn individuals into discrete free individuals, the Party and government must conform to the trend of the times, guide the situation accordingly, and make “shared development” not merely remain at the level of cultural habits but become a national code of conduct adapted to social transformation. This is a further optimization from emphasizing enormous development in the production sphere to the sphere of social distribution, including traditional means of production, labor products, and new data information and digital commodities being shared by the people, and ultimately, through institutional guarantees, greatly stimulating the autonomy of the people as the subject in China. And “shared development,” taking “common prosperity” as its logical starting point, embodies at a higher level the future production of human society as described by Marx and Engels, which “will aim at the wealth of all.” As a basic characteristic of the proletarian party, “people-centeredness” is thus transformed into the practical philosophy of “people-centered.”

人的主体性建立在对自我存在和价值的认同之上，即人可以自己支配自己，自己决定自己的内在表现和人的对象化活动的外在表现。要避免社会数字化发展可能造成的单个人成为离散的自由个体，党和政府就必须顺应时代发展的潮流，因势利导，使“共享发展”不仅仅停留在文化习惯层面，而是成为与社会变革相适应的国家行为准则。这是从强调生产领域的巨大发展，到社会分配领域包括传统生产资料、劳动产品，以及新的数据信息和数字化商品归人民共享的进一步优化，并最终通过制度保障极大地激发我国人民主体的自主性。而“共享发展”以“共同富裕”为逻辑起点，从更高层面体现了马克思、恩格斯所论述的人类社会未来生产“将以所有的人富裕为目的”。作为无产阶级政党的基本特征，“人民性”也就转化为“以人民为中心”的实践哲学。

IV. Conclusion

四、结语

Marxist historical materialism reveals that the establishment of the people’s subject status is essentially a unified process of material production and spiritual production. The Communist Party of China has explored an original theoretical thread of the people as the subject, with “each getting his due,” “common prosperity,” and “shared development” as its core value system, ultimately distilling the fundamental value concept of “people-centered” development that has consistently run through its own developmental journey. Through the three-dimensional construction of economic empowerment, political entitlement, and value enablement, it creatively unifies the rich connotations of the people as material subjects, rights subjects, and value subjects into a trinity within the practical process, establishing a value orientation for responding to who “the people” are today, where they come from, what characteristics they have, and how to view and treat them. This is the CPC’s epochal response to the Marxist “free and comprehensive development of the individual,” fully reflecting that the people, as the subjects of social material life, are the end of socialist social development, not the means. Within the discourse system of the CPC’s thought on the people as the subject, the concept of “the people” transcends the imagined “revolutionary community” and achieves a historical leap toward the “community with a shared future” that develops in social reality. [25]25 “Each getting his due” (各得其所) is a classical Chinese idiom from the *Book of Changes* (《周易》), meaning that each person or thing is placed in its proper position or receives what is appropriate. Here it is used as a value concept in the CPC’s theoretical framework.

马克思主义唯物史观揭示，人民主体地位的确立本质上是物质生产与精神生产的统一过程。中国共产党探索了一条以“各得其所”“共同富裕”“共享发展”为核心价值体系的人民主体原创性思想脉络，最终提炼出“以人民为中心”的发展这一始终贯穿自身发展历程的根本价值理念。通过经济赋权、政治确权、价值赋能的三维建构，创造性地将人民作为物质主体、权利主体和价值主体的丰富内涵三位一体地统一于实践过程，为回应今天的“人民”到底是谁，他们从何而来，有何特征，如何看待和对待他们确立了价值导向。这是中国共产党人对马克思主义“人的自由全面发展”的时代响应，充分体现出人民作为社会物质生活的主体，是社会主义社会发展的目的，而不是手段。在中国共产党人民主体思想话语体系中，“人民”概念超越了想象的“革命共同体”，实现了向社会现实发展的“命运共同体”的历史跨越。