Deep Understanding and Accelerated Development of New Quality Productive Forces
"Developing new quality productive forces is an inherent requirement and an important focus for promoting high-quality development. We must continue to do a good job in innovation and accelerate the development of new quality productive forces."
On January 31, 2024, General Secretary Xi Jinping delivered an important speech while presiding over the 11th collective study session of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee. He systematically expounded the scientific connotation of new quality productive forces from the combination of theory and practice, profoundly pointed out the great significance of developing new quality productive forces, and put forward clear requirements for their development. From proposing "new quality productive forces" during local inspections in 2023, to emphasizing "developing new quality productive forces" at the Central Economic Work Conference, and then making a systematic exposition during the Political Bureau collective study, the General Secretary's series of important discussions and major deployments on developing new quality productive forces profoundly answer the major theoretical and practical questions of "what are new quality productive forces, why develop them, and how to develop them," providing scientific guidance for promoting high-quality development on the new journey.
High-quality development requires new productive forces theory to guide it.
Marxism holds that productive forces are the material basis of all social life and the most active and revolutionary factor driving social progress. The standard of productive forces is a fundamental criterion for measuring social development. Marx and Engels pointed out, "The total productive forces that people have reached determine the social conditions." Firmly promoting the development of productive forces and continuously improving people's living standards on this basis is the fundamental starting point of all our Party's work.
The fundamental task of socialism is to liberate and develop social productive forces. The superiority of socialism over capitalism lies in its ability to develop productive forces faster and better. After the founding of New China, Comrade Mao Zedong once proposed, "The purpose of the socialist revolution is to liberate productive forces." After reform and opening up, Comrade Deng Xiaoping clearly stated, "Socialism has many tasks, but the fundamental one is to develop productive forces." Since the founding of New China, our Party has led the people to complete in just a few decades the industrialization process that took developed countries hundreds of years, promoting China to become the world's second-largest economy and creating a rare miracle of rapid economic development. A crucial point is the high emphasis on the standard of productive forces, always adhering to liberating and developing social productive forces, and continuously enhancing the comprehensive national strength of the socialist state.
Entering the new era, China's economic development has entered a new stage. The CPC Central Committee with Comrade Xi Jinping at its core regards adhering to high-quality development as the hard truth of the new era, consistently liberating and developing social productive forces, making a series of major decisions and deployments, promoting China's economy to a path of higher quality, greater efficiency, more fairness, more sustainability, and greater security. The level of productive forces has achieved huge improvements and breakthrough development, forming a new quality state of productive forces development. In response to this new situation, General Secretary Xi Jinping clearly pointed out, "New quality productive forces have already formed in practice and demonstrated strong driving and supporting power for high-quality development."
At the same time, it must be recognized that many factors restricting high-quality development still exist. For example, some key core technologies are controlled by others, industries face problems of being "large but not strong" and "comprehensive but not excellent," and there is great pressure for the production and living systems to transition to green and low-carbon. To further promote high-quality development, new industries, new models, and new driving forces must be formed, key core technologies must be firmly grasped independently, a modern industrial system that is autonomous, controllable, safe, reliable, and competitive must be built, a green low-carbon circular economy system must be constructed, and connotative growth driven by innovation must be realized. Ultimately, greater breakthroughs and development must be achieved in the level of productive forces. This poses new theoretical challenges for us and requires further deepening our understanding of new quality productive forces. General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized that developing new quality productive forces "requires us to summarize and generalize theoretically to guide new development practices." His important discussions on developing new quality productive forces point out the key focus for promoting high-quality development, reflect a profound grasp of the laws of productive forces development and the prominent problems facing China's development, provide a profound summary of the laws of China's economic construction, further innovate and develop Marxist productive forces theory, and are an important part of Xi Jinping's economic thought. They have important theoretical and practical significance, and we must study them deeply, understand them profoundly, and apply them to guide practice.
Grasping the Scientific Connotation of New Quality Productive Forces
What are new quality productive forces? General Secretary Xi Jinping pointed out: "In summary, new quality productive forces are an advanced productive force quality state dominated by innovation, breaking away from traditional economic growth modes and productive force development paths, characterized by high technology, high efficiency, and high quality, and conforming to the new development philosophy. They are born from revolutionary technological breakthroughs, innovative allocation of production factors, and deep industrial transformation and upgrading, with the leap in the optimized combination of laborers, means of labor, and objects of labor as the basic connotation, and a significant improvement in total factor productivity as the core sign. Their characteristics are innovation, the key is quality, and their essence is advanced productive forces." This important statement profoundly clarifies the characteristics, basic connotation, core sign, features, key points, and essence of new quality productive forces, providing fundamental guidance for accurately grasping their scientific connotation.
New quality productive forces are an advanced productive force quality state dominated by innovation, characterized by innovation. The key to grasping new quality productive forces lies in deeply understanding the critical role of innovation in improving productive forces. Looking back at history, from the mechanization of the first industrial revolution in the 18th century, to the electrification of the second industrial revolution in the 19th century, to the informatization of the third industrial revolution in the 20th century, each disruptive technological innovation has brought great liberation of social productive forces and a leap in living standards, fundamentally changing the trajectory of human history. Some countries seized the rare opportunities of technological revolution and industrial transformation, rapidly enhancing their comprehensive national strength and even becoming world powers overnight. Currently, a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation is poised to begin, with some major disruptive technological innovations creating new industries and new business forms. Information technology, biotechnology, manufacturing technology, new materials technology, and new energy technology widely penetrate almost all fields, driving a group of major technological changes characterized by green, intelligent, and ubiquitous features. We have ushered in a historic intersection of the world's new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation with China's transformation of development modes, facing a once-in-a-millennium historic opportunity. New quality productive forces have emerged and are continuously growing in practice. New quality productive forces represent the new direction and trend of technological revolution and industrial transformation and the development direction of advanced productive forces. Accelerating the formation of new quality productive forces means achieving a leading position in productive forces development, seizing development opportunities in new fields and new tracks, and winning the initiative in fierce international competition.
Marx pointed out that "productive forces, that is, the development of productive capacity and its elements," and "labor productivity continuously develops with the progress of science and technology." New quality productive forces are the product of the development of productive forces and technological progress, representing a revolutionary enhancement of humanity's ability to transform nature. This enhancement is holistic and fundamental, and the constituent elements—laborers, labor materials, and labor objects—inevitably have new connotations. Regarding laborers, they are the most active factor in productive forces. Those matching the new quality productive forces are no longer ordinary laborers engaged in simple repetitive work, but strategic talents capable of creating new quality productive forces and applied talents proficient in mastering new quality production materials. Regarding labor materials, as the "measuring instrument of human labor power development," with the development and widespread application of original and disruptive technologies, more and more new types of production tools will emerge, and old, outdated tools will gradually be replaced by new advanced ones, which is a main indicator of productive force development. Regarding labor objects, the improvement and widespread use of labor materials will inevitably expand the scope of labor objects, including not only traditional natural materials but also intangible forms such as data that are not limited by space and time.
Various elements of production must be combined to form real productive forces. New quality productive forces are reflected not only in the innovative development of various elements but also in the innovative development of the ways these elements combine. With the development and changes of laborers, labor materials, and labor objects in new quality productive forces, the optimized combination of the three will undergo revolutionary changes, bringing new industries, new business forms, and new models, forming new driving forces and advantages for economic development. Productive forces determine production relations, and production relations react on productive forces. The formation of new quality productive forces will inevitably cause revolutionary changes in production relations, requiring the formation of new production relations to adapt, protect, liberate, and develop them. Continuously reforming and improving production relations, forming new management models and new institutional mechanisms, is an important guarantee to promote the continuous development of new quality productive forces.
In summary, we must deeply realize that new quality productive forces are not a partial optimization or simple iteration of traditional productive forces, but advanced productive forces born from revolutionary technological breakthroughs, innovative allocation of production elements, and deep industrial transformation and upgrading. They will inevitably bring changes in development and production methods, promote a new leap in social productive forces in our country, and lay a more solid material and technological foundation for comprehensively building a modern socialist country.
Promoting the accelerated development of new quality productive forces
"We must not fall behind on the new track," "we must strive to catch up, achieve running alongside, or even leading." At the 2023 Central Economic Work Conference, General Secretary Xi Jinping's words inspired progress. On the new journey of building a strong nation and national rejuvenation, advancing Chinese-style modernization fundamentally means achieving the modernization of productive forces. New quality productive forces are essentially advanced productive forces. We must effectively unify thoughts and actions with the spirit of General Secretary Xi Jinping's important speeches and the decisions and deployments of the Party Central Committee, focus on economic construction as the central task and high-quality development as the primary task, further enhance the consciousness and initiative to promote the development of new quality productive forces, and improve practical abilities to do so.
— Accelerate technological innovation. Technological innovation can give rise to new industries, new models, and new driving forces, and is the core element in developing new quality productive forces. We must strengthen technological innovation, especially original and disruptive technological innovation, accelerate achieving high-level technological self-reliance and strength, fight key core technology battles, and cultivate new driving forces for developing new quality productive forces.
— Accelerate industrial innovation. Industry is the carrier of productive forces; only industrialization of scientific and technological achievements can become social productive forces. We must promptly apply scientific and technological innovation achievements to specific industries and industrial chains, transform and upgrade traditional industries, cultivate and expand emerging industries, plan and build future industries, and improve the modern industrial system. Centered on developing new quality productive forces, layout industrial chains, enhance the resilience and security of industrial and supply chains, and ensure the industrial system is autonomous, controllable, safe, and reliable.
— Accelerate innovation in development methods. Green development is the foundation of high-quality development; new quality productive forces themselves are green productive forces. We must accelerate the green transformation of development methods, firmly establish and practice the concept that lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets, unswervingly follow the path of ecological priority and green development, and vigorously advocate green and healthy lifestyles throughout society.
— Accelerate innovation in systems and mechanisms. Production relations must adapt to the requirements of productive forces development. To develop new quality productive forces, we must further deepen reforms comprehensively and form new production relations that correspond to them. We must deepen reforms in economic and scientific and technological systems, focus on removing bottlenecks and obstacles restricting the development of new quality productive forces. Expand high-level opening-up to create a favorable international environment for developing new quality productive forces.
— Accelerate innovation in talent work mechanisms. Talent is the primary resource; innovation-driven development is essentially talent-driven. Developing new quality productive forces ultimately depends on innovative talents. According to the requirements for developing new quality productive forces, we must smooth the virtuous cycle of education, science and technology, and talent, improve mechanisms for talent cultivation, introduction, utilization, and reasonable flow. Improve the mechanism for factor participation in income distribution, and create a good atmosphere that encourages innovation and tolerates failure.
