Shen was born on January 6, 1902, in Xiaoshan, Zhejiang Province. In 1913 he enrolled at Zhejiang Provincial First Middle School. He later graduated in 1922 from the affiliated secondary school of
Shanghai Jiao Tong University. In 1924 he began teaching at Jingxian Girls' Middle School in
Songjiang. Shen joined the
Chinese Communist Party in 1925 and in March of that year became a teacher at the affiliated middle school of
Shanghai University. In December 1926 he went to the
Moscow Sun Yat-sen University for further study. In June 1929 he was admitted to the
China Research Institute of the
Communist Academy in Moscow. He later graduated in 1931 from the Moscow Sun Yat-sen University. After returning to China, Shen worked as a university lecturer and professor between 1933 and 1938, teaching at
Jinan University in Shanghai,
Peking University, and
Northwest University. During this period he devoted himself to the teaching and research of Marxist philosophy and political economy. In 1944 Shen joined the
China Democratic League. In July 1946 he became professor and head of the Department of Economics at Dade College.
People's Republic of China period . From right:
Chu Tunan,
Jian Bozan,
Shen Junru,
Zhou Enlai,
Wu Han, and Shen Zhiyuan. After the establishment of the
People's Republic of China in 1949, Shen held several public positions. In 1951 he served in the
East China Military and Political Commission and held posts including director of the Counsellors' Office and deputy director of the Committee of Culture and Education. From 1951 to 1957 he served as chairman of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the China Democratic League. In 1955 Shen was elected a member of the
Chinese Academy of Sciences. In May of the same year he was elected vice chairman of the first Shanghai Municipal Committee of the
Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference. In 1956 he became a researcher and director of the Shanghai Institute of Economics under the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Shen authored several influential works in Marxist economics, including
Outline of New Economics and
Outline of Planned Economics. Shen died in
Shanghai on January 26, 1965, at the age of 63. == References ==