In view of some misunderstandings of Wang Guowei's theory of "academic independence", this paper points out that the deep implication of Wang's idea of "academic independence" lies in his rejecting a "non-academic" tendency that stresses superiority of value judgments in scholastic studies. Through an analysis of Wang's understanding of "academic", this paper tries to expound the mission of Wang's theory of "academic independence" from three angles of learning independence, scholar independence and method independence, and shows its significance on Chinese modern academic enlightenment and on reality.