China News Agency, Beijing, March 4th, title: Li Yining: "Breakthrough Era" Reform Pioneer
"China News Weekly" reporter Wang Yu
At 19:31 on February 27, 2023, the famous economist Li Yining passed away at the Peking Union Medical College Hospital at the age of 92.
"The ninety-two-year-old man has exhausted his energy during the three years of fighting the disease." Meng Xiaosu, Li Yining's student and former chairman of China Real Estate Development Group, used a eulogy to commemorate his teacher.
Li Yining, whose ancestral home is Yizheng, Jiangsu, was born in Nanjing on November 22, 1930, and moved to Shanghai with his business father.
After the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War, he moved to Yuanling, Hunan with his mother. In 1951, he was admitted to the Department of Economics of Peking University from Hunan, and began to live in Peking University for more than 70 years.
At Peking University, Li Yining successively served as data officer, teaching assistant, lecturer, associate professor, professor, doctoral supervisor, senior professor, director of the Department of Economics and Management of Peking University, dean of Guanghua School of Management of Peking University, and was still the honorary dean of Guanghua School of Management of Peking University before his death .
Li Yining.
Photo by Wang Chen
"Mr. Li's introduction to Western economics in the 1980s enlightened a generation. His thoughts and suggestions on China's economic reform showed profound theoretical insights and great courage to break through the times." Gao Shanwen, Chief Economist of Essence Securities Send condolences.
uninvited young man
In 1983, in the late spring morning, Peking University.
Holding the unfamiliar address they just asked, young people Ping Xinqiao and Xie Baisan, who had just participated in the postgraduate entrance interview the day before, came excitedly to a teacher's dormitory in Weixiu Garden, and knocked on the door rashly.
After being let in with a smile by the hostess, they discovered that Mr. Li Yining, whom the students admired, and his family of four were living in a small apartment of more than 30 square meters.
In the smaller room, 53-year-old Li Yining is lying on the desk, writing on the 400-character square Peking University manuscript paper. On the big bed behind him are stacks of books and bags of kraft paper full of materials and manuscripts. bag.
"Write about 3 pages early in the morning, and then do other things." Seeing young people entering the room uninvited, Li Yining got up and told them softly.
In 1978, Li Yining's views on China's economic reform and opening up were finally allowed to be published publicly.
In 1980, Li Yining proposed the reform of the shareholding system. He published a large number of articles advocating the reform of China's economic system and calling for the establishment of a market economy. He was the first scholar in China to put forward the theory of shareholding system reform.
"I remember holding a seminar in Yantai in July 1981. Teacher Li and I lived in the same dormitory. Teacher Li asked me a question, and he said, Feng Qi, do you think China's method of raising funds through the shareholding system is okay? I That’s totally fine.” From then on, under the leadership of Li Yining, Cao Fengqi, a young scholar at Peking University’s School of Economics, devoted himself entirely to research on the joint-stock system.
In 1982, "On Socialist Effective Investment and Rational Investment" was published. Li Yining used this article to call for the liberalization of social fund-raising to replace unreasonable state investment.
At this time, Cao Fengqi was also inspecting Chinese companies extensively under the guidance of Li Yining, and realized that the main problem of Chinese companies represented by state-owned enterprises was not a lack of funds, but a backward business management system.
"Enterprises lack motivation internally and external pressure." Cao Fengqi believes that China's corporate reform is not about tinkering to solve problems, but institutional reform, "that is, the implementation of the shareholding system."
"The two of us are really stupid." Ping Xinqiao recalled in the future.
On the morning when I first met Li Yining, Ping Xinqiao probably didn't know that the most important reform in the long and far-reaching reform of China's economic system in the future was being promoted by the teacher.
And these young people who have been inspired, led and guided by Li Yining will also become the backbone practitioners of the Chinese economy in the future.
On December 29, 1998, Li Yining attended the sixth meeting of the Standing Committee of the Ninth National People's Congress in Beijing and passed the "China Securities Law" by voting.
Photo by Pu Li
"When I become a data officer, I have to think more openly"
Before becoming an advocator of joint-stock theory who made great contributions to the theory of reform and opening up, Li Yining was first a scholar of Western economic history who devoted himself to research and connected the past and the future.
In 1951, after being admitted to the Department of Economics of Peking University, Li Yining, who was diligent in reading in the atmosphere of "land reform" in the whole school, was excerpted from the economic history of Western Europe in the library. To Professor Zhou Binglin, who specializes in the economic history of Western Europe.
At that time, Zhao Naituan and Zhou Binglin were neighbors who lived in Building 29 of Yandongyuan Professor's Dormitory.
Li Yining always went to Professor Zhao's house first, and then to Professor Zhou's house to borrow books, talk, and receive instruction.
During the four years of Peking University, Li Yining laid a solid foundation in economics and economic history.
After graduating in 1955, Li Yining was left in the Economics Department of Peking University as a data clerk, engaged in the compilation of economic history data.
Knowing that he was able to stay in Peking University, Zhao Naitan was very happy, and comforted him: "You are not a teacher, but a data officer, you should be more open-minded, don't worry about fame, as long as you have real talents and learning, fame counts." What?"
Zhou Binglin, who was very happy that Li Yining stayed in school, directly assigned the task.
Knowing that Li Yining taught himself Russian, and his level was good, he asked him to translate materials written by Soviet scholars on the economic history of Western Europe.
As Zhao Naituan said, Zhou Binglin valued Li Yining very much and asked him to contribute to the two most important economic history magazines in the library of Peking University, Journal of Economic History and Economic History Review. History Review) to compile content summaries of papers published over the years.
"This suggestion by Mr. Zhou has benefited me all my life, because from then on, under the guidance of Mr. Zhou, I began to enter the academic field of Western European economic history." Li Yining once recalled.
However, the time to concentrate on academic research is short.
At the beginning of 1958, Li Yining became the first group of faculty members to be devolved in the "Anti-Rightist" movement. He worked in Xizhaitang Village, Mentougou District, Beijing, which was called the "Beijing West Mining Area" at that time, and returned to Peking University in the spring of 1959.
At that time, it was the starting point of the "Three Difficult Period".
A year ago, for translating "Foreign Economic History (Era of Feudalism)" by Poliansky, Li Yining received labor fees from Joint Publishing. He used the money to get married, settle down and bring his grandmother, mother and younger brother Li Yiping from Wuhan to Beijing. come and live.
In 1959, Li Yining already had a child, and his wife was far away in Anshan, Liaoning. The family of five rented in three simple one-story houses in the No. 4 courtyard of Sugong Family Temple in Haidian. Life was difficult, and they could only rely on translation fees to supplement their living.
"What moved me was that Mr. Zhou and Mr. Zhao both walked from Peking University to my humble home to visit me. They saw that my family was so poor and still immersed themselves in reading and translating, and kept encouraging and comforting me. The scene, I still remember it in my heart." Li Yining recalled later.
In 1963, Zhou Binglin passed away.
At the memorial service, Li Yining burst into tears.
Mr. Wei Bi, the teacher's mother, held his hand and told him with tears: "Mr. Zhou places his research work on you, you have to work hard!"
Two years later, Li Yining finished the translation of "Social and Economic History of the Roman Empire", which his teacher had placed high hopes on during his lifetime, and handed it over to the Commercial Press.
However, before it could be published, the "Cultural Revolution" began. Li Yining first accepted supervised labor in the Department of Economics, and was finally sent to Liyuzhou Farm by Poyang Lake in Jiangxi and Daxing in Beijing to work.
Li Yining seldom mentioned that period, and only explained the change of his economic thinking and research direction: "The change of my personal economic thinking did not start from the three-year difficult period, but from the period when the Liyuzhou Farm was devolved to work. .”
"Where sand sinks unintentionally, it becomes a continent"
When he graduated from Peking University that year, Li Yining wrote a song "Partridge Sky": The stream is clear and clear, and it goes down the stone ditch, and it will never turn back after thousands of twists and turns.
Compatible and inclusive, the end is broad, Ruogu is empty and fishes swim by itself.
The heart is silent, the thoughts are resting, and the sand is unintentionally forming a continent.
This should be the case for studying in a lifetime, only counting hard work and not asking for income.
"Where the sand sinks unintentionally but becomes a continent", the 25-year-old Kou Zhan has become a summary of Li Yining's lifelong study. Looking back at the poems of that year, Li Yining also picked out this line: "When I was studying in the Economics Department of Peking University, Who would have imagined what would happen ten, twenty,... fifty years after graduating from university? But in any case, the road is made by people, and knowledge is accumulated year by year.”
In addition to first proposing the theory of shareholding reform, Li Yining also proposed the theory of unbalanced economic development in China, discussing China’s “dual transformation” of “transforming from a planned economic system to a market economic system, and from an agricultural society to an industrial society”.
In addition, Li Yining's contribution to China's economic system reform also includes: proposing to change the dual structure of urban and rural areas, deepening rural reform, and promoting China's urbanization process; promoting joint-stock reform and enterprise listing, and guiding the drafting of the "Company Law of the People's Republic of China" and so on.
In December 2010, Li Yining went to the impoverished area of Zhaotong, Yunnan, to learn about the living conditions of local farmers.
Ren Dongshe
Li Yining also inherited the ambition of cultivating young people from several mentors.
In 1989, Cao Fengqi was criticized by some people for his research on shareholding system reform, and even his qualification to be a professor was disqualified.
"In the very difficult situation at that time, Teacher Li has always supported and protected me."
Similar things happened to Meng Xiaosu who published "On Some Strategic Issues of my country's Economic Reform".
The dissertation caused an uproar, and met with the criticism of "market economy" in the ideological and theoretical circles.
"I asked Teacher Li Yining: Do you want me to refute them? He said: No, the more you refute, the more aggressive they will be. Now someone has written a 'criticism of Li Yining', and I have not responded to them." Meng Xiaosu recalled.
Thereafter, in 1992, the central leadership clearly stated that "our goal is to establish a socialist market economy."
Subsequently, the "socialist market economy" was written into the party constitution and the constitution, and the judgment that "China's reform has entered a deep water area" was also written into the central document.
On March 6, 2017, Li Yining listened to reporters' questions at the press conference of the Fifth Session of the Twelfth National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.
Photo by Tomita
"In the days when Teacher Li Yining passed away suddenly, I once again opened the economics masterpiece "Strategic Choices for Prosperity" written by him. What came out of my tears was his burning sentence: 'Reform is an unstoppable trend!' "Meng Xiaosu wrote in his eulogy: "He pointed out every word sonorously: 'Our point of view is to stabilize the economy while deepening reform. Reform will bring confidence and hope to people. We can only have this kind of assumption, This choice must also be made.'” (End)