Abstract: Xi Jinping’s people-centered theory inherits and develops Mao Zedong’s view of people. The people-centered theory insists on the people-centered value in all fields of the governance of the country, while it inherits Mao Zedong’s view of people in such aspects as sticking to the people’s subjectivity, sticking to the people’s status as the history creators and sticking to the philosophical thinking mode of contradictory dialectics, and it even develops Mao Zedong’s view of people in such areas of the new subjects and new ideas for the people’s welfare, the new cognition and new methods in carrying out the mass line, and so on. This theory has integrated Marxist universal principles with China’s concrete national conditions, and has become the ideological weapon for the Chinese Communist Party to lead the Chinese people to manage the state affairs. While carrying forward the genetic advantages of Chinese civilization and people-oriented doctrines of Chinese tradition, it has enriched the scientific socialist theory and has gone through practical tests and will continue to undergo practical tests.

Key words: people-centered theory; view of people; Xi Jinping; Mao Zedong; socialism with Chinese characteristics