In the study of MaoZedong thought, the research on his economic thoughthas been relatively weak. There has been even a popular opinion for a period of time that MaoZedong does not have economic thoughts. He hadn’t read Das Kapitaland hewas a layman in the economic construction. There are probably two main reasonsfor such an opinion: one is because in the late period of MaoZedong’s leadership, he put forward the idea that class struggle is the key, and there had been big mistakes likethe "great leap forward" and "cultural revolution" which undermine the healthy development of economy. The other is because MaoZedong hasn’twritternEconomicswith important and systematicimpact like that of his famousworks---"On Contradiction" and "On Practice". However, this opinion is not in conformity with the facts and should be corrected.

　　With Marxism as its guiding ideology and theory, the Communist Party of Chinaalways pays much attention to the studying,researching, propaganda and popularization of Marxist theories. As one of the three most important parts of Marxism,regarded by Lenin as "the most profound, comprehensive and detailed proof and implementation ofMarxist theory", Political Economicshas also been emphasized without any doubt. Early in the revolutionary war times, MaoZedong emphasized: "Whoever does not pay attention to theresearch of production cannot become a good leader." Mao had carefully read all the Marxist Economics works that could be found back thensuch as Marx'sCritique of the Gotha ProgramandDas Kapital.Among those works,he had read for many timesThe Basic Theory of Marxist Economicsand The Outline of Economicswrittern by the famous Japanese Marxist economist---Hajime Kawakami (河上肇). He personally organized the collection of material reflecting the history and present situation of economic and financial aspects and wrote down "Onthe theory of economic problems and financial problems during the Anti-Japanese War Period" and other important economic reports. The theory of economic construction at the revolutionary base and theeconomic program of new-democratic revolution put forward by Mao, is an important guide to the new democratic revolution. However, in general, the focus of MaoZedong’s reading and research in the revolutionary war period was philosophy and military, etc.,relatively less attention was paid toEconomics. This kind of situation changed after the founding of new China.After the founding of new China, economic work became the focus of the entireparty; Political Economics had also become the focus of MaoZedong's reading and research subsequently. In the transitional period of socialism, Mao Zedongled the party and the people to creatively transform the capitalist industry and commerce with the policy ofstate capitalismand peaceful redemption, and transform individualagriculture and handicraft industry with gradual transition, which opened up a path of socialist transformationsuitable for China’s situation, addressed both in terms of theory and practicethe difficult task of setting up a socialist economic system in an economically and culturally backward country like China which accounts for nearly a quarter of the world’s population, andenriched and developedthe Marxist economic theory of transition.

　　After the socialist system is established,combining the basic theory of Marxism with the reality of China, CPC members represented by MaoZedongtry to find a suitablesocialist construction path in accordance with China’s conditions. During this process they set up independent, relatively complete industrial system and national economic system,achievegreat achievements of the socialist economic construction,accumulate the experience of the pros and cons of the socialist economic construction, and at the same time put forward many precious thoughts about the socialist economic construction,such as:Based on agriculture and dominated by industry, agriculture, light and heavy industry should developcoordinately; Withoverall consideration and proper arrangement, the relation between accumulation and consumption should seek for the comprehensive balance; The incentive of both central and local government are important, which all need to be given full play; To deal with the relationship between the mainland industry and coastal industry well to promote the development of both; To deal with the relationship between the state, the collective and individual well to make every party performs accordingly;Construct independent and relatively complete industrial system and national economic system, fully realize the modernization of agriculture, industry, national defense and science and technology, make China’s national economy to walk in the forefront of the world; Rely mainly on our own efforts whereforeign aid is complementary---on the one hand, getting rid of the superstition that we cannot be successful by ourselves, working independently on industry, agriculture,technology revolution and the cultural revolution; on the other hand we should learn from foreign experience, especially to take notice of the lessons, and so on. Combining the inheritance from classical Marxism writerswith China's reality, these viewsare innovation and development of the socialist economic theory created byclassical Marxism writers.After the founding of new China, especially after the establishment of socialist system, China is faced with enormous taskof economic construction and therefore is in urgent needs for the guidance of economic theory. However, the teaching materials of Political Economicspopular in China back then arethe famous Political Economics textbookswritten by Institute ofEconomicsResearch,Soviet Academy of Sciences, presided over and guidedby Stalin.The shortcomings in theorywouldnaturally be reflected in practice. Such shortcomings caused MaoZedong’s concerns.He said, “After the liberation, from 1950 to 1952, when we tried to recover our national economy, we were almost totally ignorant of the economic construction. Shortly afterwards, when we staged the first five year plan, the situation was not better, so we had to copy the Russian example. Nevertheless, we find ourselves unsatisfied,even a bit depressed.”Confronting this kind of situation, MaoZedong put forwardthe "second combination" between Marxism-Leninism and China’s reality based on the experience and lessons of the Soviet Union, the creation of new theories and thepublication ofnew books. To that end, he wrote works withsignificant theoretical innovation and of great guiding importance such as"On Ten Relationships" and so on.During this period, MaoZedong hadgiven unprecedented attentionto socialist Political Economics. He stressed that "It is of great theoreticaland practical significanceto study Political Economicsat the present". "Economic construction has scientificlaws; we need to learn in an earnest manner". From 1958 to 1960, MaoZedong repeatedly suggested the party cadres to readThe Problems ofSocialist Economy in Soviet Union byStalinand the third edition ofPolitical EconomicsTextbooks---“Socialism” written by Institute ofEconomicsResearch,Soviet Academy of Sciences. He took the lead to make up his mind to learnEconomics. Heread for many times Stalin’s The Problems ofSocialist Economy in Soviet Union, the number of editions he had endorsed alone is four. It is worth mentioning that, in three months’time from December 1959 to February 1960, comrade MaoZedong and Deng Liquntogether read carefully part ii of Political EconomicsTextbooks, i.e., the parts on socialism, section by section and paragraph by paragraph. Besides reading, the two comrades also expressed their views. These conversations were later compiled asThe Notation and Conversation of MaoZedong’s Reading ofSocialist Political Economics.The Notation and Conversation of MaoZedong’s Reading ofSocialist Political Economicis an extremely important literatureinMarxist Political Economics, especially the socialist Political Economics,a thought treasure that is yet to be explored and advocated.It reflects comprehensively and centrally MaoZedong's economic thought, especially the thought of socialist economy, and reveals the theoretical and historical logic ofSinicization of Marxist Economics, therefore it has great value in terms of both theory and history.In this literature, MaoZedong affirms the right aspects of Soviet textbooks, while at the same time points out the “serious shortcomings and principled errors” in the textbook. Combining China's realitywiththe basic theory of Marxism,he explored a series of major issues of socialist Political Economics and put forward a lot of insights, including: The aim of socialist economy is to serve for the people, therefore socialism must pay attention to the social collective welfare; opposing both egalitarianismand excessive disparity in income distribution; dealing with the relation among the development of heavy industry, light industry and agriculture. The development of socialist economy is curly; the socialist economic development has to go throughunderdeveloped and developed stages; to improve the highly centralized economic management system by increasing the autonomy of the enterprises and the localgovernments;commodity production and exchange still play a positive role in socialism, the law of value is a great school;we need to believe in the masses and rely on the masses in socialist construction, to safeguard workers’rights of managingstate, army, enterprises, culture and education, to adhere to combination of the leadership of the party and the mass movement, etc. These insightscontainmany important, ingenious theoretical achievements, which are important contributions to the development of socialist Political Economics.

　　The exploration and strive of CPC members represented by MaoZedong in the 30 years before the reform and opening upnot only laythe important systemand material foundation for the development of socialism with Chinese characteristicsafter the reform and opening up, but also lay the important theoretical basis. MaoZedong's exploration of socialist Political Economics is still of important guidance and enlightenment significanceto the current development of socialism with Chinese characteristics. Wecan take a few examples to illustrate.

　　First,the great leap forward in science and technologyand the technical revolution. MaoZedong attached great importance to the extreme importance of science and technology in socialist construction and treated the modernization of science and technology as an important part of socialist modernization. He first proposed the idea of leapdevelopment and independent innovation as follows: “We cannot just follow the beaten track traversed by other countries in the development of technology and trail behind them at a snail’s pace. We must break away from conventions and do our utmost to adopt advanced techniques in order to make China a powerful modern socialist country in not too long a historical period. This is what we mean by a giant stride forward.”

　　Second, the relations ofinterestsin socialist society.MaoZedong stressed that material benefits is an important principle, but is not the sole principle. Socialist construction must unified material incentive and spiritual incentive, both cannot be ignored. At the same time, the materialinterests do not only refer to personal interests, temporary interests and local interests, they also refer to collective interests, long-term interests and overall interests.Personal interest should subject to collective interests, temporary interests should subject to long-term interests, partial interests should subject to overall interests. All the aspects of the interests should be balanced and satisfied in a proper manner.

　　Third,the reform of the economic management system. MaoZedong said that the most important issue after solving theownership issue is the management problem, i.e., how to manage the enterprises of public and collective ownership, which is an issue of interpersonal relationships. MaoZedong thought: it is necessaryfor cadres to "appear asordinary workers with an equal attitude to others". The management of the enterprisescan "take the form ofthe combination of centralized leadership and the mass movement incorporatingthe masses of workers, cadres and technicians series, where cadres should participate in laboring and workers should participate in the management so as to continuously reform the unreasonable regulations".

　　Fourth, the role of commodity production. In the late 1950s, MaoZedonghad carried on earnest thinkingabout commodity production under the socialist system andgot the following conclusion: "We need to take advantage of commodity production, commodity exchange and the law of valuenow as a useful tool to serve socialism." Confronting the wrong ideathat confusing commodity economy with capitalism, he pointed out that: "the character of commodity production depends ontheeconomic system it is associated with. The one that is associated with the system of capitalism is the capitalist commodity production;the one that is associated with the socialist system is the socialist commodity production."

　　MaoZedong is a great Marxist, which does not only fully reflect in aspects such as philosophy, politics and military thoughts, but also in Political Economics. His exploration of and contribution to the socialist Political Economics, is a precious spiritual heritage. He committedthe errors in his later lifebecause he deviated from the correct theory and propositions he proposed, and turned to the route with class struggle as the core. The huge setback suffered in the socialist economic construction as a result isa lesson we must remember profoundly.