Editor’s Note
On November 8, 2025, the first batch of volumes in SUFE’s Discipline History series was released. The developmental journey of the School of Economics embodies the dedication and academic inheritance of generations of economists. A Discipline History of the School of Economics, Shanghai University of Finance and Economics systematically traces the school’s academic lineage and vividly records the evolutionary logic of economics in China. While carrying forward academic traditions, it also nurtures immense potential for future innovation. Against this backdrop, the School of Economics launches the column Jinghong · Academic Heritage. The column will sequentially introduce the development trajectories and features of each discipline within the school. Through these focused vignettes, we gather momentum from the past, stimulate innovative thinking by sustaining academic legacies, and contribute SUFE’s insights to building an independent knowledge system for Chinese economics.
The discipline of History of Economic Thought and Economic History at Shanghai University of Finance and Economics (hereafter the “Two Histories” discipline) boasts a century-long developmental history. As early as the 1920s, the university pioneered courses such as Economic Doctrines and History of Economics. Distinguished scholars including Li Quanshi and Tang Qingzeng dedicated themselves to research and teaching, laying a solid foundation for the Two Histories. After the discipline of History of Economic Thought was reconstructed in the early 1950s, prominent scholars represented by Hu Jichuang and Ye Shichang emerged. Academic leaders such as Tan Min, Du Xuncheng and Zhao Xiaolei inherited the academic ethos of earlier generations and steered the discipline through its transition from traditional to modern scholarship. In 2011, the School established China’s first Department of Economic History among universities, enabling interdisciplinary integration between economic history and the history of economic thought.
Economics is a historical science. For more than a century, SUFE’s Two Histories discipline has taken root in the fertile ground of Chinese economic historiography and consistently contributed to constructing China’s independent knowledge system in economics. The History of Economic Thought, after sustained long-term development, has become the only national key discipline of its kind among Chinese universities. The development of the Two Histories discipline falls into four phases: Inception and Early Development (1924–1949), Establishment and Initial Development (1949–1993), Transition and Rapid Expansion (1993–2011), and Elevation and Integrated Development (2011–present).
(1924–1949)
01. Inception and Early Development
With the spread and development of economics in China during the 1920s, Shanghai College of Commerce began offering undergraduate courses from 1924 including History of Economics, Economic Doctrines, Chinese Economic History, and World Economic History, marking the origin of SUFE’s Two Histories discipline. In subsequent periods under the Fourth Sun Yat-sen University, Kiangsu University, the Business School of National Central University, and National Shanghai Business School, courses related to economic history such as Chinese fiscal history and Chinese and foreign banking history remained on the curriculum. SUFE was therefore among China’s earliest institutions to deliver courses on economic history and the history of economic thought.
A cohort of eminent scholars emerged, including Li Quanshi, Tang Qingzeng, Peng Xinwei, Li Gan, Zhang Yushan, Ye Yuanlong, Zhang Sumin, Yang Yinpu, Wu Yugan and Wang Zhixin. They authored foundational works in economic historiography such as A History of Chinese Currency, Outline of Chinese Economic History, A History of Chinese Economic Thought, A Short History of Chinese Economic Thought, and History of Economic Thought.
Li Quanshi held a master’s degree from the University of Chicago and a PhD from Columbia University. His A Short History of Chinese Economic Thought (1927) ranks among China’s earliest works on the history of economic thought. Tang Qingzeng, a Harvard master’s graduate, spent a decade completing Volume One of A History of Chinese Economic Thought (1936). Proficient in five languages, Peng Xinwei began drafting A History of Chinese Currency in 1943. Revised repeatedly, its third edition ran to 770,000 characters and is hailed as the definitive synthesis on Chinese currency history. Yang Yinpu once served as Acting Dean of the Business School of National Central University and published works including On China’s Finance. Zhang Yushan wrote History of Economic Thought; Ye Yuanlong authored A Critique of Marshall’s Theory of Value; Wu Yugan produced The Opium War; Wang Zhixin published A History of Savings Banks in China.
It was the arduous pioneering work of these forerunners that laid the bedrock for SUFE’s Two Histories discipline.
(1949–1993)
02. Establishment and Initial Development
In the national faculty restructuring of 1952, economics faculty from multiple East China universities converged at Shanghai College of Finance and Economics. In 1979, the Ministry of Education approved China’s first teacher training program on Chinese history of economic thought hosted by Shanghai College of Finance and Economics. The Chinese Society for the History of Economic Thought was founded in 1980. Master’s programs in Chinese and foreign history of economic thought were launched in 1984. In 1987, the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council approved the first pilot doctoral program in the integrated field of Chinese and foreign history of economic doctrines. These groundbreaking milestones cemented SUFE’s leading standing in the domestic academic community for the Two Histories.
This era is inseparable from Hu Jichuang and his contributions to the Chinese history of economic thought. After joining SUFE in the 1950s, Hu built systematic teaching and research for this field. His three-volume A History of Chinese Economic Thought was the first comprehensive general history of Chinese economic thought guided by Marxism, establishing the foundational research framework for this field. He personally drafted lecture notes and taught for the national teacher training program; most participants later became core academic faculty at universities nationwide. The lecture notes were published as A Concise Reader on Chinese Economic Thought, which won the Special Prize for Excellent University Textbooks nationwide. Well into his eighties, Hu completed two English monographs to demonstrate to global academia that Chinese economic thought was comparable to, and at times ahead of, Western thought before the 17th century.
Many other seminal scholars and publications appeared in this period. Ye Shichang’s A History of Chinese Monetary Theory filled a gap in research on modern monetary theory history. Zhou Bodi, who transitioned from revolutionary activist to economist, wrote A History of Chinese Public Finance. Guo Xianglin published A Concise Modern Chinese Economic History. Yao Jiahua and Sun Yin co-authored A Brief History of Chinese Economic Thought. Yao Jiahua’s edited volume A History of Commercial Economic Thought was described by Hu Jichuang as “the first academic monograph on the history of commercial economic thought”. Qi Guangying’s edited History of Economic Doctrines was designated a textbook under the Ministry of Finance’s Eighth Five-Year Plan.
(1993–2011)
03. Transition and Rapid Development
Building on the fine scholarly traditions of earlier generations, a new cohort of scholars including Tan Min, Du Xuncheng, Zhao Xiaolei and Yan Guohai took forward the discipline. Alongside the development of the socialist market economy and advances in economic theory, teaching and research within the Two Histories discipline moved toward modernization, standardization and rigorous scholarship, achieving rapid growth.
Professor Tan Min successively served as Vice President, President and Party Secretary of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics. He also chaired the Discipline Appraisal Group for Theoretical Economics under the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council, served as President of the Chinese Society for the History of Economic Thought, and Vice Chairman of the Shanghai Federation of Social Science Associations. His doctoral dissertation The Chinese Origins of the Physiocratic Doctrines is widely regarded as having “lifted a two-century-old fog over the history of economic doctrines and satisfactorily resolved the question of Chinese origins of physiocracy”, carrying major domestic and international significance in economics. Upon publication, it received the Second Prize of Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award. He edited series including A History of Economic Thought in New China, A Coursebook on the History of Chinese Fiscal Thought, and Catalogue of Chinese Economics Books (1900–1949). His co-authored A History of Chinese Fiscal Thought won the First Prize of the Ministry of Finance Excellent Textbook Award and the Second Prize of the Fourth China Book Award. His co-edited Outline of the History of Economic Thought in New China received the First Prize of Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award.
Professor Du Xuncheng’s monograph National Capitalism and the Republican Chinese State (1840–1937) won the Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award and was selected as one of the 25 landmark works over 25 years under the Shanghai Academic Publication Fund. His works Institutions, Functions and Transformations of Shanghai Finance (1897–1997) and A Sino-Foreign Comparative History of Financial Institutional Change received the Seventh and Eighth Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Awards respectively. He has published more than one hundred papers in leading authoritative journals including Social Sciences in China (4 articles), Historical Research (9 articles), and Studies in Chinese Economic History (21 articles).
Professor Zhao Xiaolei’s major academic works include Research on China’s Industrialization Thought and Development Strategy, A Concise History of Foreign Economies, A History of Economic Theory in New China, The Development of Modern Chinese Economic Theory, and Outline of the History of Economic Thought in the People’s Republic of China. He is a National Excellent Teacher and recipient of the 7th Sun Yefang Economic Science Award (1996), the 3rd Liu Shibai Economics Award (2016), the First Prize of the 8th Ministry of Education Outstanding Research Achievements in Higher Education (Humanities and Social Sciences) (2020), and the Third Prize of the 9th Ministry of Education Outstanding Research Achievements in Higher Education (2024). He has repeatedly won Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Awards and Shanghai Government Decision Consulting Achievement Awards. His edited A History of Economic Theory in New China received the Second Prize of the National Excellent Textbook Award from the Ministry of Education in 2002. His edited A History of Chinese Economic Thought has been selected three times for national planning textbooks and twice awarded Shanghai Excellent Textbook Prize.
Two landmark achievements marked this phase: in 2002, the History of Economic Thought was accredited as the only national key discipline of its kind among Chinese universities. In 2011, SUFE established China’s first Department of Economic History, opening a new chapter for integrated development.
(2011–Present)
04. Elevation and Integrated Development
In April 2011, the School of Economics founded the Department of Economic History, the first of its kind nationwide. The department prioritizes cross-disciplinary integration and coordinated development between the history of economic thought and economic history, systematically investigating economic ideas and economic issues across Chinese history. Meanwhile, the Two Histories discipline expanded international academic exchange through both inbound and outbound collaboration: appointing overseas co-chairs and distinguished overseas professors, hosting and participating in international economic history conferences, and publishing English-language monographs. In this period, the discipline achieved new breakthroughs including major National Social Science Fund projects, inclusion in the National Philosophy and Social Sciences Achievements Library, national talent schemes, and key textbooks under the Marxism Research and Construction Project, cementing its leading domestic standing.
Professor Cheng Lin, Senior Professor at SUFE, Director of the China Institute for the Development of Economic Thought, Chair of the Department of Economic History, member of the State Council Discipline Appraisal Group for Theoretical Economics, recipient of the Special Government Allowance of the State Council, and Distinguished Professor under the National Talent Program of the Ministry of Education. He previously served as President of the Chinese Society for the History of Economic Thought. As chief expert for a major National Social Science Fund project, he serves as chief editor of the key Marxism Research and Construction textbook A History of Chinese Economic Thought. His honours include the Liu Shibai Economics Award and Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award.
Professor Wang Fang, Vice President of the Chinese Society for the History of Economic Thought, Deputy Chief Editor of the key Marxism Research and Construction textbook A History of Chinese Economic Thought, and chief expert for a major National Social Science Fund project. She has received the Liu Shibai Economics Award, Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award, and the First Prize of Shanghai Excellent University Textbook Award.
Professor Yan Hongzhong, Young Scholar under the National Talent Program of the Ministry of Education, Vice President of the Chinese Economic History Association, and chief expert for a major National Social Science Fund project. He contributed to the key Marxism Research and Construction textbooks A History of Chinese Economic History and Chinese Finance. His awards include four first prizes of provincial and ministerial social science outstanding achievement awards and two Outstanding Research Achievement Awards in Humanities and Social Sciences from the Ministry of Education.
Professor Wu Shanlin, Director of the Research Center for Chinese Economic Strategy and Policy Thought at the China Institute for the Development of Economic Thought, and chief expert for a major National Social Science Fund project. He serves on the editorial boards of Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Studies in Political Economy, and Haipai Economics. He is Vice President of the China Association for the Study of Foreign Economic Doctrines and Standing Director of the Chinese Society of Political Economy.
The Department of Economic History has built a strong academic echelon through both recruitment and in-house cultivation. In recent years, it has recruited overseas doctoral scholars including Yan Dong (PhD, UCLA), Zhao Xuan (PhD, University of Manchester), Diao Wentian (PhD, National University of Singapore) and Duan Li (PhD, University of Hong Kong). It also hosts outstanding domestically trained PhDs such as Sun Lin, Li Yaohua, Chen Xudong and Yue Xiangyu. The research outputs of these young and middle-aged scholars appear in leading domestic and international journals including Economic Research Journal, Historical Research, Studies in Chinese Economic History, People’s Daily, Guangming Daily, History of Political Economy, Cambridge Journal of Economics, and Journal of Development Economics.
Professor Tan Min’s monograph Retracing History: The Prehistory of the Dissemination of Marxist Economics in China received the Monograph Award of the Sun Yefang Economic Science Award and Nomination Award of the Second China Government Publishing Award. His 1917–1919: Enlightenment in the Dissemination of Marxist Economics in China won the First Prize of the Fifth Outstanding Achievements in Marxist Research, the First Prize of the Shanghai Book Award, and the China Excellent Publication Award. His 1920–1929: The Dissemination of Marxist Economics Seen from Republican-Era Works received the First Prize of the 16th Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award.
Professor Du Xuncheng’s six-volume The Historical Logic of China’s Modern Economic Transformation analyzes the developmental trajectory of modern Chinese economics from a multi-dimensional perspective. Rooted in indigenous historical context, it explores internal laws and evolutionary logic within modern Chinese economic development and offers a panoramic interpretation of the historical logic behind China’s modern economic transformation.
Professor Cheng Lin’s The Historical Status and Modern Value of Traditional Chinese Economic Thought was selected for the National Philosophy and Social Sciences Achievements Library. He edited the 11-volume series Research Library on the History and Thought of Modern China’s Economic Transformation, funded by the National Publication Fund, and the 9-volume series Road to Rejuvenation: Research on Economic Thought in New China, included in the 13th Five-Year National Key Publication Plan and awarded the Second Prize for Works in the Shanghai Philosophy and Social Sciences Outstanding Achievement Awards.
Professor Yan Hongzhong’s A History of the Sino-Japanese Currency War (1906–1945) was selected for the National Philosophy and Social Sciences Achievements Library. His Currency, Credit and Trade: Exploring Modern Finance in Manchuria (1860–1931) was designated a 13th Five-Year National Key Book and supported by the National Publication Fund. He also serves as chief editor of the textbook A History of Chinese Finance.
Professor Zhao Xiaolei’s Outline of the History of Economic Thought in the People’s Republic of China: Development and Transformation of Economic Thought (1949–2019) has been published in Russian by Nestor-Historia Publishers in Russia and in English by Royal Collins Publishing Group in Canada. It is distributed across more than 50 bookstores in over 20 countries and held in the library collections of more than 20 prestigious institutions including Harvard University Library and Stanford University Library.
Professors Cheng Lin, Wang Fang and Terry Peach co-edited two English volumes published by Routledge in the United Kingdom and distributed globally: The History of Ancient Chinese Economic Thought (2014) and The Political Economy of the Han Dynasty and Its Legacy (2019).
Platform Building and Internationalization
The China Institute for the Development of Economic Thought was founded in 2020, with 22 researchers and six research centers. This expanded the disciplinary layout from a single department to a combined “Department + Institute” structure.
For international engagement, the team collaborated with the History of Economics Society (UK) to host its annual conference at SUFE, marking the first time the society’s flagship meeting was held outside Europe. Faculty members have repeatedly been invited to organize dedicated panels on Chinese economic thought and deliver keynote addresses at premier global academic conferences including the World Economic History Congress.
Over the past century, the Two Histories discipline has accomplished three transformative leaps: from individual courses to a formal discipline, from a teaching and research office to a combined department-institute platform, and from translating and introducing foreign scholarship to producing original academic output for global circulation.
05. Discipline Outlook
A century of scholarly heritage, passed from one generation to the next. From the academic seeds sown by pioneers such as Li Quanshi and Tang Qingzeng, to the systematic construction of the discipline by Hu Jichuang and other senior scholars; from the modernization of disciplinary paradigms advanced by Tan Min, Du Xuncheng, Zhao Xiaolei and their peers, to the global academic outreach of scholars including Cheng Lin, Wang Fang, Yan Hongzhong and rising young researchers — the evolution of the Two Histories discipline embodies the enduring academic lineage of SUFE.
Upholding the university motto Strive for Virtue and Knowledge, Assist in Economy and Governance, the story of SUFE’s Two Histories discipline continues to unfold. Looking ahead to the 15th Five-Year Plan and beyond, the discipline will keep adapting to the demands of the times, build consensus, pool strengths and resources, overcome developmental bottlenecks, and elevate its standing as a world-class discipline. It will continue to deliver robust academic output and talent training to support the national strategy of building China’s independent knowledge system in economics.
