Wang Mang bases his sweeping reforms, intended to remedy the economic crisis into which the Han dynasty has fallen, on his revival of Zhou dynasty classics concerning the ideal Confucian state.

He institutes such radical measures as abolition of slavery, imposition of an income tax, currency debasement, nationalization of the land, and state loans to peasants at moderate interest rates.

A descendant of the Han rulers, Liu Xiu, effects a restoration of the old dynasty.

Wang Mang’s brief rule thus separates the Han Dynasty into two periods: that of the Former, or Earlier, Han, and that of the Later Han.