Wang Anshi attached great importance to the selection, training and use of talents and took measures to reform the imperial examination system. Abolish the Ming Classics by rote, and stipulate that Jinshi will not take the examination of poetry and fu, but only classics and current affairs.
Reform the imperial examination system
Content: The Gong Ju Law was promulgated, which abolished the Ming Classics, while the Jinshi examination focused on Confucian Classics and strategic theory, and added legal subjects.
Function: Put the foothold of imperial examination on the balance of selecting talents with the ambition of saving the world and practical learning, and expand the number of examination places.
Wang Anshi's political reform was a social reform movement initiated by Wang Anshi in Song Shenzong period, aiming at changing the situation of poverty and weakness since the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty. The reform began in the second year of Xining (1069) and ended in the eighth year of Yuanfeng when Song Shenzong died (1085), so it is also called Xining reform and Xifeng reform.
Wang Anshi's political reform aimed at developing production, enriching Qiang Bing and saving the political crisis in the Song Dynasty, with "financial management" and "army consolidation" as the core, involving political, economic, military, social and cultural aspects. It is another massive social reform movement in the ancient history of China after Shang Yang's political reform. To a certain extent, the political reform changed the situation of poverty and weakness in the Northern Song Dynasty, enriched the government's finances, improved the national defense strength, and also cracked down and restricted the illegal profits of the feudal landlord class and big businessmen. However, in the process of carrying out the reform, due to untimely measures and improper operation in actual implementation, the people's interests have also been damaged to varying degrees (such as the Law on Protecting Horses and the Law on Young Crops), and the new law touches the fundamental interests of the big landlords, so it has been strongly opposed by them. The eighth year of Yuanfeng (1085) ended with the death of Song Shenzong.