20世纪初，中国的世界史学步入学科化的进程，但由于缺乏研究底蕴，材料和研究条件不足，难以推动高水平的世界史研究成果面世，教学也极不成熟。1949年新中国建立后，世界史学科全方位学习苏联，大量翻译苏联教学大纲和教材、论著，高等院校开始组建世界史教研组，世界史教学建立起以阶级斗争为历史主线，将重大事件作为分界，对世界史进行上古、中世纪、近代和现代四段划分的体系。同时，苏联专家到中国教授世界史课程及为教师举办进修班。中国派出一批留学生赴苏学习历史，接受更全面的学术训练。学习苏联的风潮与政策的导向密切相关，因此也随之波动与转向。中国学者在学习的热潮中，有冷静的自主思考；在批判的狂潮中，亦有客观的肯定意见。

世界史学科的研究范围向亚非拉史拓展。“亚洲史”学科不仅正式建立起来，而且成为独立于“世界史”外的学科，但因其师资匮乏、体系难以建立以及在教学实践中与“世界史”学科难以分割等问题，“亚洲史”最终取消独立建制，回归“世界史”学科中。在非洲史发展的局势下，亚非史的教学与研究逐渐合流。“亚洲史”学科借鉴了苏联“古代东方学”研究成果，但其特殊设置与划分并非移植自苏联，而是出于中国自身的学科追求和现实驱动。“古代东方学”与“亚洲史”的学科范畴和关系的问题在当时未被提出来进行讨论，但从材料和实际教学情况来看，“东方史”主要作为世界上古史的教研参考，“亚洲史”则着重近现代史研究。中国学者反思“东方史”的名称范畴不清晰的问题与其“欧洲中心论”偏向，逐渐弃用。非洲拉美解放运动的蓬勃开展，以及中国与其友好关系的不断加强，对非拉史研究的发展起了促进作用。总体上，“世界史”的教学和研究在多方面取得了重要的进展，体系化的学科建设初具雏形。

同时，中国的世界史研究者重视探讨宏观世界史体系方面的重大问题。世界上古中古史的分期基于对“五种社会形态”的理解，因此牵涉到古代东方奴隶制的发展、亚细亚生产方式等问题。由于中国的封建制度在世界文明进程中的突出，世界中古史的开端问题与中国封建社会起于何时的讨论相互关涉。世界史学者既受该中国史问题讨论的影响，又以世界史的视角参与其中。该问题的分歧还进入到苏联科学院编纂《世界通史》的中苏合作中。以范文澜为代表的秦汉以前封建论者，与以林志纯为代表的“魏晋封建论”者在该问题的论证上存在着历史解释方向的重要差异：中国历史在世界文明发展中主要是具有独特性还是普遍性。而相关讨论都源动于在学理上否定中华文明停滞论的诉求。由于自新中国初期历史教学中就存在“详今略古”的倡导，及至1958年“厚今薄古”之论占绝对优势，加之与现实的密切关系及政局的直接影响，导致世界近现代史的分期问题持续热议。世界史的中心问题由周谷城《论西亚古史的重要性》一文掀起集中而热烈的讨论，从世界史可否有以欧洲为中心的叙述、世界史有没有中心、如何确定世界史的中心问题，到透过叙述比重，论及“欧洲中心论”的实质性错误。亚非拉史研究的成果积累和理论积淀，推进了该问题讨论的质的提升与层次的深入，在政治环境动荡的岁月中有着宝贵的学术含量。

新中国十七年时期，尽管深受政治的干预与影响，但中国的世界史学科建设一直存在着中国学者的自主思考，传续着中国学者对世界史学的不懈追求：建立整体的世界史研究体系，和争取世界史的历史解释权、自主构建中国的世界史体系的重大关怀。

At the beginning of the 20th century, the promulgation of a series of official teaching documents began the process of subjectification of world history in China. Around 1919, young scholars who had studied abroad returned to China to take up their posts, laying the foundation for world history education in higher education. However, world history in higher education in this period was still very immature, and the lack of research foundation, materials and research conditions made it difficult to promote the publication of high-level research results. After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the discipline of world history studied the Soviet Union in an all-round way and translated a large number of Soviet teaching syllabuses, textbooks and treatises. Universities began to set up world history teaching and research groups, and established a world history teaching system with class antagonism as the main line of history and a certain historical event as the boundary to divide world history into four sections: ancient, medieval, modern and contemporary. At the same time, Soviet experts came to China to teach world history courses and to organize training courses for teachers. A number of Chinese students have been sent to the Soviet Union to study history and receive more comprehensive academic training. The trend of learning from the Soviet Union is fluctuates and turns according the direction of policy. Because of the differences between the national conditions of China and the Soviet Union and the need for China to develop world history with Chinese characteristics, there are contradictions in the process of learning the Soviet Union. In the frenzy of criticizing the Soviet Union, some Chinese scholars have retained their affirmation of the Soviet Union's world history.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the study scope of world history expanded to Asian, African and African history. The discipline of "Asian history" was not only formally established, but also became an independent disciplinary system from "World History". However, due to the shortage of teachers, the difficulty of establishing a system and the difficulty of separating the discipline from the discipline of "World History" in teaching practice, "Asian history" was finally cancelled as an independent institution and returned to the discipline of "World History", and merged with the study of African history. The setting of "Asian history" draws on the research results of the "ancient Orientalism" of the Soviet Union, but it was not transplanted from the Soviet Union, it was driven by China's own discipline pursuit and reality. The subject category and relationship between "Ancient Orientalism" and "Asian history" have not been raised and discussed. However, from the perspective of materials and actual teaching situation, "Oriental History" was mainly used as a reference for teaching and research of world ancient history, while "Asian History" focused on the study of modern and modern history. As for the name of "Eastern history", Chinese scholars believe that its category is unclear and it has a Eurocentric bias, and gradually abandoned. The vigorous development of the liberation movement in Africa and Latin America, as well as the continuous strengthening of the friendly relations between China and Latin America, have played a positive role in promoting the development of the study of African and Latin American history. As a whole, the teaching and research of "World History" have made important progress in many aspects, and the systematic discipline construction has begun to take shape.

Meanwhile, Chinese world history researchers pay attention to the major problems in the macroscopic world history system. Based on the understanding of the historical materialism of "five social forms", the problem of the stages of the world's ancient and medieval history involves the development of slavery in the ancient East and the mode of production in Asia. Due to the prominence of China's feudal system in the process of world civilization, the question of the when the world’s medieval began and the question of when China's feudal society began is related to each other. The scholars of world history are not only influenced by the discussion of Chinese history, but also participate in it from the perspective of world history. The disagreement over this issue also involved Sino-Soviet cooperation on the compilation of The History of the World by the Soviet Academy of Sciences. Between the scholars represented by Fan Wenlan who believe that China entered feudal society in the pre-Qin period and the scholars represented by Lin Zhichun who believe that China entered feudal society in the Wei and Jin dynasties, there is a difference in historical interpretation: whether Chinese history is unique or universal in the development of world civilization. However, they all tried to deny the appeal of the "Chinese civilization stagnation theory" in academic theory. Since 1949, in history teaching, there has been the advocate of "reviewing the present and slighting the past", by 1958, the argument of "strengthening the present and slighting the past" has been absolutely dominant, coupled with the close relationship with the reality and the direct influence of the political situation, leading to the continuous hot discussion on the issue of the staging of modern world history. The central issue of world history has been intensively discussed, which arose by Zhou Gucheng in his essay the Importance of the Ancient History of West Asia, from whether there can be a European-centric narrative of world history, whether there is a center of world history, and how to determine the central issue of world history, to the substantive errors of the "Eurocentric theory" through the proportion of narrative. The accumulation of achievements and theoretical accumulation in the study of the history of Asia, Africa and Latin America has promoted the qualitative improvement and in-depth level of the discussion of this issue, and has valuable academic content in the turbulent political environment.

During this period, despite the interference and influence of politics, there has always been the independent thinking of Chinese scholars, which has continued the internal pursuit for "World History": to establish a whole "World History" research system, and the great concern for the historical interpretation of world history and the independent construction of China's "World History" system.