北宋承唐、五代舊制，重視國家藏書，更推廣教育。秘書省經多次改制，是為國家藏書中心；國子監除教育行政外，並兼有書籍印製及發行之責任。自太祖「杯酒釋兵權」之後，帝權高漲；皇帝成了真正的集權獨裁者。政府雖推重儒家思想，但國防廢弛，又缺外患之警覺；是以一互外敵入侵，不免倉皇南渡。
畢昇一介小民，走在時代尖端，雖發明了活字印刷術，但不能為當時社會廣泛採用。但這發明必對他國印刷之發展有所影響。

The Northern Sung Dynasty is a very important period in Chinese history. For the first time, the emperors had absolute power of ruling and the development of education was put ahead of that military expansion. Meanwhile, printed books were widely accessible to the commoners due to the improvement of printing and paper making techniques. While this newly available treasure stimulated a keen social mobility, it also created a new social class, the educated elite. This educate elite has been an influential class in all aspects of cultural, political, and economical development in China ever since.
Movable type was invented during this period, but for various reasons, it was not widely adopted in China for many years. Nevertheless, this new techniques might have been influenced the development of printing in other countries.