Abstract
<jats:p>The evolutionary history of security interests aligns with the legal recognition of emerging new forms of value, an analytical model provided by ancient Roman law: Agricultural commercialization gave rise to the non-possessory pledge, urbanization to the actio in rem, the monetary economy altered credit satisfaction from the lex commissoria to the sale of the pledge, and the deepening of credit defined rules on the priority ranking of multiple pledges. Every innovation followed the path of economic need – contractual practice – jurisdictional recognition – doctrinal elaboration, a path that also frames the development of security interests in post-reform China: the 1995 Security Law resolved the credit crisis, the 2007 Property Law systematized the field, and the 2020 Civil Code (Art. 388, I) completed the shift from formalism to functionalism across three dimensions: the integration of non-typical security interests, the restructuring of value rules, and the unified regulation of priority. With the rise of digital assets and carbon credits, China’s institutional practice extends this logic: the vitality of a legal institution hinges on the law’s ability to respond to economic rationality.</jats:p>