Historians usually regard Tan Sitong as a bourgeoisie democratic revolutionary or a leftist among the reformists, but this opinion is biased.

The author has analysed various political organizations founded by the civic groups,most of which were revolutionary and reformist.

With the change of the domestic social,political and economic situation from 1901 to 1904 the capitalist class split into reformists and capitalist revolutionaries.

The Differentiation of Reformists and the Failure of the Reform Movement of 1898

Afetr making a comparison between Guo and the "Westernization Movement" sect in economy, politics and education, the essay holds him to be a capitalist reformist.

The bourgeois meliorate, in latter-days China, was the outcome of the social contradictions development;they had unique consequence in the history of China and produced gigantic influences on the development of Chinese latter-day.

With the deepening of western affairs movement and the forming of the thought trend of taking commerce seriously,reformist intellectuals who proposed commerce began to transform their concept of agriculture,and gradually formed new concept which fitted modern society.