在西漢的政治舞臺上，武帝所扮演角色的重要性與活躍程度，並不下於高祖劉邦。在武帝大權獨攬、獨裁專政的運作下，一個龐大帝國自他手中建立了；也由於一意徇私的輕率作風，一手把新興帝國的命脈斵傷了。其中興衰成敗的關鍵，乃繫於武帝個人的政治作風，與舉用人才的得失。 武帝爲了建立個人功業，在人才的舉用上，較之前朝，有很大的突破與改革，班固曾稱許爲「漢之得人，於茲爲盛」。本文所採史料，以《史記》爲主，《漢書》、《資治通鑑》爲輔，將武帝在位五十四年，依人才的任用情形分爲承先、初興、盛興、中衰、中興五個時期，從各期所舉用的文治武功的人才，看武帝一朝的興衰治亂之跡。

On the political stage of the Former Han Dynasty, The importance and the active degrees of the role played by Emperor Han Wudi are no less than that of Emperor Gaozu Liu Bang. In the procedure of Emperor Han Wudi's dictatorship, a huge empire was established by him. However, resulted from Han Wudi's acting willfully and his heady style, the lifeline of the emerging empire was slashed by his own hand. The crucial key to rising, declining, success and failure of the empire is bound to Emperor Han Wudi's own political style and the gain or loss of his employment policy. In order to set up his own exploits, there are huger breakthrough and innovation in his employment policy than that of former Chin Dynasty. Ban-gu had praised and said "The winning of popularity and support is flourishing at this moment." The historical material picked by this article is mainly based on 《Shih-chi》 and assistantly based on《Han Dynasty Book》 and《Zi Zhi Tong Jian》. It divides the ruling period (fifty-four years) of Han Wudi into five phases according to the situations of Employment Policy, which are the phase of .inheritance, the early phase of flourishing, the phase of fully flourishing, the phase of growing weak, and the phase of reanimation. It analyses the employment policies including civilian officials, military officials during each phase and therefore we can view the trace of the rise, decline, public orders, and disorders of Emperor Han Wudi's Dynasty.