On the afternoon of April 13, 2019, the kick-off meeting of the “Economics Workshop of SE PKU, RUC, THU, NKU and IE CASS” co-launched by the School of Economics (SE) of Peking University (PKU), Renmin University of China (RUC), Tsinghua University (THU), Nankai University (NKU), and the Institute of Economics (IE) of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) was successfully held in meeting room 410 of SE PKU. Zhao Zhun and Li Bangxi from the Institute of Economics under the School of Social Sciences of THU, and Liu Zhen from the School of Marxism of THU attended the meeting and delivered speeches.
The experts and scholars attending this forum include Liu Wei, President of RUC, Dong Zhiyong, Dean of SE PKU, Cui Jianhua, Secretary of the Party Committee of SE PKU, Zhang Hui, Deputy Dean of SE PKU, Professor Fang Min and Professor Zhao Xiaojun at SE PKU, Professor Qiu Haiping from the School of Economics of RUC, Xie Fusheng, Deputy Dean of the School of Economics of RUC, Associate Professor Zhao Feng from the School of Economics of RUC, Professor Zhang Xu from the School of Marxism Studies of RUC, Liu Fengyi, Director of the Department of Economics of NKU and Deputy Dean of the School of Marxism of NKU, Associate Professor Qiao Xiaonan with the School of Economics of NKU, and lecturers Feng Zhixuan and Zhao Min with the School of Economics of NKU, Hu Leming, Deputy Director of IE CASS, Hu Huaiguo, Director of the Political Economy Research Office of IE CASS, Guo Guanqing, Director of the Research Office of Capital of IE CASS, and Zhang Lin, Deputy Dean of the School of Economics of Yunnan University.
The kick-off meeting was hosted by Zhang Hui, Deputy Dean of SE PKU. According to Zhang, the purposes of the Economics Workshop are to build a community of political economics discipline, give play to the collective strength of the teaching and research personnel of scientific research institutes, especially young and middle-aged teachers, strengthen the studies of academic frontiers, interdisciplinary and major practical issues, and improve the undergraduate teaching level and graduate students’ training quality in the area of political economy.
Zhao Zhun and Li Bangxi shared their understanding and feelings about the current political economy research, teaching, student cultivation and evaluation system. Zhao Zhun believes that both political economy and Western economics need to use scientific methods to study the real economy in actual operation and explore general economic laws. In this regard, the mainstream economics in the West has fundamental problems. The outbreak of the subprime mortgage crisis in 2008 cannot be separated from the shortcomings of the theory. In the theoretical framework of political economy, many vibrant and important theories and concepts, such as capital, accumulation, profit rate, surplus labor, necessary labor, and labor process need to be developed in the study of real problems. In terms of how to give play to the advantages of political economy in this respect and verify the correctness of theory with actual data, Zhao Zhun recommended Capitalism: Competition, Conflict, Crisis, an advanced political economy textbook published by Anwar Shaikh in 2016.
Li Bangxi believes that the current teaching of political economy needs to be further strengthened. The study of political economy needs to refer to scientific mathematical methods and empirical research, and for the training of students, the weight of political economy in the whole training system should be increased to a certain extent. He suggested that the evaluation system of political economy should have both generality and certain particularity, and also value the authority of key periodicals in this discipline.
