Abstract: Sun Yat-sen’s people’s livelihood, i.e. his probable ideological deliberationover socialism, formed between A.D. 1890-1911. The western socialist doctrine was the important ideological source of his people’s livelihood, which was practically the aim of value designed by him as modernized socialism in China. It leaves a question open to determine its nature as “subjectively socialism and practically capitalism”.

Key words: Sun Yat-sen, Three People’s Principles, people’s livelihood, western socialist doctrine, bourgeois democratic revolution in China, modernization