On March 31, 2026, Lu Wei, a professor at the School of Economics of Dongbei University of Finance and Economics, published a theoretical article "Accelerating the Construction of China's Independent Knowledge System of Finance" in the 01 edition of the "Chinese Social Sciences Journal".
The full text is below.
Accelerate the construction of China’s independent knowledge system of finance
Lu Wei
General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out that we must focus on building philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics in accordance with the idea of based on China, learning from foreign countries, exploring history, grasping the present, caring for mankind, and facing the future. Accelerating the construction of philosophy and social sciences with Chinese characteristics is ultimately the construction of China’s independent knowledge system. To build China's independent knowledge system of public finance, we need to deeply cultivate local practice, adhere to dialectical thinking, historical perspective and problem orientation, and continuously promote knowledge innovation, theoretical innovation and method innovation in public finance.
Broaden the perspective of financial research with dialectical thinking
To build China's independent knowledge system of finance, we should adhere to the principle of serving the past for the present and foreign knowledge for China, grasp the resources of Marxism, the resources of China's excellent traditional culture, and the resources of foreign philosophy and social sciences, and broaden the perspective of finance research on the basis of comparison, contrast, criticism, absorption, and sublimation.
Use Marxist methodology to analyze China's fiscal phenomena. More consciously adhere to and use the dialectical materialist worldview and methodology to study major theoretical and practical issues in the fiscal field. On the one hand, we must adhere to the perspective of practice first, understand China's basic national conditions and economic development stage characteristics from objective reality, and use this to dialectically analyze the internal logic of fiscal phenomena. On the other hand, we must grasp the basic principles of the contradictory movements of things and persist in observing things in a developmental, comprehensive, systematic, and universally connected manner, so as to understand the complex interest relationships and deep-seated contradictions behind financial phenomena. For example, from the complex relationship of multiple co-governance, we can understand the architecture and core content of the modern budget system.
Draw on the financial ideas from China’s excellent traditional cultural resources. Drawing financial wisdom from China's excellent traditional cultural resources is crucial to understanding the profound historical origins and broad realistic foundation of China's independent knowledge system of finance. The difficulty lies in how to excavate the cultural spirit that spans time and space, transcends countries, is full of eternal charm, and has contemporary value, so that it can be used to guide modern fiscal practice through creative transformation and innovative development. The concept of using frugality to enrich the people can be traced back to the idea of "using frugality to benefit the people through propriety and enriching the people through politics" in "Xunzi Fu Guo" in the pre-Qin period. It advocates using the etiquette system to save money on national fiscal expenditures and using decrees to reduce taxes and enrich the people. To correctly understand the current underlying logic of using money sparingly to enrich the people, we must combine the party and the government's leadership in living a tight life with allowing the people to live a good life. We must understand that the purpose of saving money is to maximize social benefits and people's livelihood benefits from limited financial resources.
Absorb and learn from useful perspectives and academic achievements in foreign finance. Constructing China's independent knowledge system of public finance must not only be based on the country's reality, but also open to research and absorb foreign theories, concepts, discourses, and methods in an analytical and critical manner. From a research theory perspective, the views of different financial scholars and different schools should be examined and grasped as a whole, so as to fully understand the true ideological connotations of different theoretical branches. Following the thinking path of phenomena-problems-theories-concepts, we explore the logical deduction process behind the existing theories of Western finance, apply good thinking methods to analyze Chinese fiscal phenomena, and conduct abstraction and generalization based on solid empirical research. From the perspective of research tools, compared with the use of quantitative methods themselves, the key is to extract China's unique propositions from realistic observations.
Clarify the rules of financial practice based on the big historical perspective
To build an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance, we should adhere to the macro-historical view, analyze the evolution mechanism and explore the historical laws from the long history, the tide of the times, and the global situation, and form a comprehensive understanding of the laws of China's fiscal operations, the laws of the behavior of fiscal subjects, and the laws of the reform of the fiscal system.
Compare "self" with "others" and observe China's financial operating rules from a global perspective. To build an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance, it is necessary to pay attention to the national character while continuously improving its global influence. On the one hand, to understand China’s fiscal operations, we need to place it within the larger world history to derive its particularity and universality. On the other hand, building an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance should break through a single cultural perspective and achieve innovative development in dialogue with world civilizations. For example, based on a global perspective, we understand that "finance is the foundation and important pillar of national governance." China and the West have constructed different fiscal systems in the process of moving toward a modern state. Through connection and comparative analysis of the selection of fiscal tools, institutional arrangements, and legitimacy that serve the realization of state functions, we can further think about the direction, path, and motivation of China's move toward a modern state, as well as the inherent connection between finance and national governance.
"Broad" and "subtle" are connected to reveal the behavioral rules of financial subjects from the depth of history. Human beings are the subjectivity, initiative and creative force of historical development. The construction of China's independent knowledge system of public finance should combine grand historical narratives and micro case studies, and deeply analyze the behavioral choices and interactive relationships of different subjects. To understand the current deployment of increasing local autonomous financial resources and further standardizing local government economic promotion behaviors, we can analyze how changes in power allocation, incentive direction, and pressure structure affect local government behavior from the perspective of institutional arrangements and policy adjustments.
"History" and "reality" are connected, and the laws of fiscal system reform are summarized from the development trends. Observing historical China is an important perspective from which to observe contemporary China. Building an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance should sort out the laws of reform in the continuity and progress of historical development. On the one hand, the study of history cannot cut off the internal connections of history, and the experience of fiscal reform should be summarized from the practical exploration of socialist construction. When analyzing the design of fiscal systems and mechanisms in different historical periods, we must understand their historical role and rationality on the basis of fully considering the ideological, material, institutional and other conditions at that time, and dynamically observe the formation and evolution of the system. On the other hand, reform, development, and stability are the main threads for understanding China’s development trends and the laws of fiscal system reform. Building an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance requires an in-depth explanation of the relationship between finance, reform, development, and stability.
Promote fiscal theory innovation with a problem-oriented approach
Excavate new materials, discover new problems, propose new perspectives, and construct new theories from the practice of China's reform and development, and scientifically answer questions about China, the world, the people, and the times with original theories.
Go deep into China's issues and analyze the unique role of finance in Chinese modernization. The realistic requirements of accelerating the establishment and improvement of a fiscal system that is compatible with Chinese-style modernization point to the construction of an independent knowledge system of Chinese fiscal science. We can focus on the Chinese characteristics, essential requirements, important principles and major relationships of Chinese-style modernization, carry out theoretical innovation around the intrinsic relationship between finance and Chinese-style modernization, observe and understand the particularity of Chinese-style modernization from a fiscal perspective, systematically sort out modern fiscal functions that adapt to the needs of Chinese-style modernization, and explore fiscal system reform ideas based on the risks and challenges that may be faced in the process of Chinese-style modernization.
Solve the world's problems and explain the principles of fiscal policy in the context of a century of changes. Promoting economic growth while improving fiscal resilience is obviously a practical problem that needs to be answered urgently in building China's independent knowledge system of public finance. Currently, major changes in the world that have not been seen in a century are accelerating, and the pattern of international cooperation and competition has undergone profound changes. China's development has entered a period in which strategic opportunities and risks and challenges coexist, and opportunities outweigh challenges but uncertainties are increasing. Facing the world's problems of sluggish growth and shifting momentum, fiscal policy urgently needs to play a role in promoting stable and sustainable growth. Building an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance can deeply explore the logical starting point, mode of action and practical results of China's more active fiscal policy, analyze the internal mechanism of fiscal policy affecting economic resilience, and the policy logic of fiscal and financial coordinated efforts to respond to risk challenges, and provide ideas and methods for solving world problems.
Respond to the people's questions and summarize the underlying logic of finance in dealing with emergencies and worries. Different from the capital logic of Western finance, the construction of an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance should take the people's nature of finance as its value and clarify the essential characteristics and advantages of China's finance. On the one hand, the construction of an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance should be based on the transformation of the main contradictions in Chinese society, with the comprehensive development of people as the core to analyze the fiscal expenditure structure and policy direction, as well as the historical experience and future ideas of fiscal system reform. On the other hand, building an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance should deeply realize the development logic of the deep integration of people's livelihood improvement and economic development, analyze the intrinsic relationship between "development-oriented finance" and "security-oriented finance", and the positive role played by finance in forming a virtuous cycle of "people's livelihood expenditure-domestic demand growth-economic development-fiscal revenue increase".
Answer the questions of the times and build a new fiscal theory adapted to the digital age. To build an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance, we should fully understand the profound changes in fiscal revenue forms, fiscal and taxation collection and management methods, and government governance models in the digital era, and explore new ideas and new paradigms in fiscal research in the digital era starting from digital technology and the new concepts, new business formats, and new models derived from it. On the one hand, the digital economy is a new economic growth point and a potential area for increasing fiscal revenue. Constructing an independent knowledge system of Chinese finance can focus on the new deployment of the tax system that is compatible with new business formats, combine the development foundation of the digital economy, industrial structure, enabling effects, etc., to study the logic of fiscal revenue and expenditure in the context of digital economicization and economic digitization. On the other hand, digital finance is an important part of strengthening the construction of digital government. The construction of China's independent knowledge system of finance can be based on the digital finance construction experience of Zhejiang, Jiangsu, Guangdong and other provinces, from the perspectives of data elements, system platforms, institutional construction, management innovation, rule of law construction, public participation, etc., summarize the internal mechanism of digital technology empowering scientific fiscal management, and reveal the development trends and laws of digital finance construction.
(The author is a distinguished professor at the School of Economics, Dongbei University of Finance and Economics)
