The establishment of the imperial examination system is a major reform of the official selection system in ancient China. It adapted to the historical trend of the rise of the civilian landlord class and opened the way for all classes of the landlord class to join the ruling group. The imperial examination system implemented in the Sui Dynasty was followed by the later feudal dynasties, and it continued to develop and improve, becoming the basic system for selecting officials in feudal countries. Compared with the system of selecting officials before Sui Dynasty, it is beneficial to selecting talents, improving administrative efficiency and playing an important role in maintaining centralized feudal rule.
In slave society, the main official positions were hereditary. Feudal society gradually adopted the method of selecting officials. During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, officials were elected by local governments. The criteria for selecting officials in the Zheng Zhi system of Jiupin are all based on family background, so the children of noble families are selected as top-level officials, while those in cloth can only be selected as low-level officials of inferior quality, resulting in the phenomenon that "the top grade is poor and the inferior is homeless".
With the development of feudal economy and agricultural production, the economic strength of the clan landlord class has been continuously strengthened and its number has been increasing, forming an important social force. They want to get a corresponding position in politics and choose officials according to their official ranks, which blocks their career path. In addition, this practice is easy to cause aristocratic families to manipulate local political power and dominate one side for a long time, so it is increasingly unsuitable for the ruling interests of feudal dynasties. After the establishment of the Sui Dynasty, in order to strengthen centralization and expand the political foundation of the landlord class, Emperor Wendi of the Sui Dynasty officially abolished the Zheng Zhi system with nine grades and delegated the power of selecting officials to the central government. It is stipulated that each state should select three people each year on the basis of gorgeous articles and recommend them to the court. Later, he ordered Beijing officials, local officials and secretariat officials with five or more grades to recommend talents with "good conduct" (talent) and "honesty and integrity" (high moral character). After Yang Guang, Yang Di ascended the throne, and he founded the Imperial Examination Department. The state selects talents through examinations, and those who pass the examinations can become officials of the central or local governments. This is the beginning of Chinese imperial examination system.
The Tang Dynasty inherited and greatly developed the imperial examination system created by the Sui Dynasty. Examination subjects are divided into routine subjects and system subjects. Courses are held regularly every year, and systematic courses are subjects established by the emperor's temporary imperial edict. Since Wu Zetian, there have been martial arts exercises, which were tested by the Ministry of War.
The progressive function of imperial examination system;
(1) broke through the monopoly of aristocratic families on official career and played a role in restraining the gate valve;
(2) The source of officials expanded, and a large number of humble civilian landlords and intellectuals joined the political power through the imperial examination, which expanded the ruling foundation of the Tang Dynasty and made the cremation system gradually die out.
(3) The imperial examination combined reading examination with being an official, which improved the cultural quality of officials;
(4) The imperial examination centralized the power of selecting talents and appointing officials from local predators to the central government, which greatly strengthened centralization and was conducive to political stability.
Negative effects: The imperial examination system also led people to concentrate on exams and ignore practical knowledge.