BEIJING - It reveals something about Jiang Zemin's leadership of China that in the eyes of many, the greatest legacy he could leave would be to give up that leadership, as he is soon expected to do.
If that's not a rousing endorsement, rousing is a word not usually associated with Jiang, 76, who is to relinquish his post as Communist Party general secretary next month and the presidency in March.
Jiang, who is visiting the United States this week and meeting Friday with President Bush in Texas, succeeded two larger-than-life icons of modern history, Mao Tse-tung and Deng Xiaoping. By contrast, Jiang is described as "bland," "cautious" and "uninspiring." In 13 years in power, he has tried to create a cult of personality like his predecessors', without success.
For just that reason, scholars and political observers say, Jiang may have been the right man for China at the right time. The country, roiled by Mao's disastrous Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution and radically transformed by Deng's economic reforms, stood to profit from a period of calm.
"You can't revolutionize a country if you want to develop it," said a Western diplomat here. "China probably needed someone with less character than Mao. [Jiang] is uninspiring, and that's what China needed, an uninspiring leader. Because inspiration has done a lot of bad things for China."
Should Jiang step down peacefully, making room for Vice President Hu Jintao, it would be the first time in Communist China's history that power has changed hands without bloodshed, a leader's death or purges.
A fitting capstone
Jiang is giving up his post reluctantly, some say, and wants to remain influential, but in an authoritarian system, even such a handover counts as progress. And it would serve, they say, as a fitting capstone to Jiang's tenure, an era of stability and progress at a time when China sorely needed both.
Making what is likely his final visit to the United States as China's leader, Jiang represents a nation with a fast-growing economy, an improving image on human rights and an increasing hand in international affairs, including membership in the World Trade Organization and the prize of playing host to the 2008 Summer Olympics. Most notably, Jiang is firmly in charge at the end of a 13-year reign.
Such circumstances were virtually unimaginable in 1989, when the Shanghai party chief rose to power in the aftermath of the bloody crackdown in Tiananmen Square.
With a somewhat unpolished public persona and a cautious political disposition, the bespectacled engineer from a Yangtze River town was widely viewed then as a short-term fix. Jiang was an inoffensive choice to succeed Zhao Ziyang, his ousted predecessor as general secretary and a reformer who advocated a conciliatory approach to widespread student demonstrations.
"He came into power in very unsettled circumstances," said Dali Yang, a China expert at the University of Chicago.
At first, Jiang's claim to power was nominal: Deng, the man who anointed him, was still China's de facto leader, and unlike Mao and Deng, Jiang did not have credentials as a war hero.
The country he took over was struggling mightily with a transition to a market economy and suffering from divisions among its leaders over the path the government should take.
Since then, as Bruce Gilley describes it in his biography Tiger on the Brink, Jiang has guided China in the direction of a "developmental dictatorship" along the lines of Singapore and Malaysia, "coupling economic and social freedoms with strict political and media controls."
Socialist ideology, redefined under Deng, was redefined again almost to the point of absurdity. Now Jiang wants the party to amend its constitution to welcome capitalist entrepreneurs.
Jiang has maneuvered China to this point with much help and little boldness. That was especially true in his first few years.
"He'd sit on the fence and blow whichever way the wind blows," said Richard Baum, author of Burying Mao: Chinese Politics in the Age of Deng Xiaoping.
In a 1991 speech, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Baum said, Jiang spoke of "class struggle," language dating to the Cultural Revolution that made him appear conservative.
A critical turning point arrived in early 1992, when Deng traveled through southern China to campaign for accelerated economic reforms. It was a cause strongly opposed by conservative elements in the party. Jiang ultimately backed Deng.
"His support at that particular time, I think, helped rescue the reforms," Baum said. "And from that time on, there was no going back. That was the last critical branching point, when the conservatives could have reversed the reforms and didn't."
As Deng faded, Jiang consolidated his power. He quelled serious challenges from within the party. He won over the military, in part by providing fatter budgets. He even managed to persuade the military to divest itself of business interests.
"That required a very, very tough political decision to be made, and the will to push it through," a Western diplomat here said.
"Do I know how he did that? No," Baum said. "I assume that he bribed those that needed to be bribed and threatened those that needed to be threatened. But it was rather impressive."
Jiang also managed to overcome criticism from conservative elements in the party on his handling of foreign policy. Whenever mini-crises arose with the United States, he has tended to advocate a more conciliatory, patient approach, which has paid off with generally smooth relations.
"Chinese foreign policy has been sensible," said Joseph Y.S. Cheng, professor of political science at City University of Hong Kong. "It has been maintaining the objective of trying to maintain a peaceful international environment to concentrate on development domestically. The idea is keep your head low and concentrate on the economy."
The fast-growing economy also has pulled China into closer engagement with the rest of the world.
"The Chinese economy has become much more integrated with the international economy, and China is more concerned with its international image," Cheng said. "Human rights have improved, and ... China has been more responsive to international popular opinion."
With high-profile prisoner releases and rhetoric about adhering to the rule of law, China has been more sophisticated in fostering a softer public image on human rights. But experts disagree on whether it has actually made significant strides. Information is still rigidly controlled, limiting knowledge of any government abuses.
Amnesty International USA urged Bush in a letter last week "to address grave human rights concerns" in his meeting with Jiang. Amnesty cited a "pattern of crackdowns and repression initiated by the Chinese government against ethnic and religious groups and political opponents," including the spiritual movement Falun Gong.
Gilley, Cheng and others have argued that China's continuing lack of tolerance for dissent and organized groups underscores Jiang's greatest failure: the utter lack of reform of one-party, undemocratic rule.
'A corrupted system'
Perhaps the most ardent critic of the regime is Bao Tong, an aide to Jiang's predecessor, Zhao. Bao, 70, lives in an apartment in southwest Beijing under close government watch.
"It's a corrupted system. This system entitles the leader with unlimited and unsupervised power," said Bao, speaking on a telephone he says is tapped. "I don't think it is possible to talk about democracy if you don't stop the roots of corruption, which is to stop giving absolute and unlimited power to one person."
Corruption severely taints the economic reforms, Bao says, which have benefited only those in the ruling party and their friends, widening the gap between rich and poor, and, more pointedly, between the party and the general public.
"The richest people are those who have the most power, their wives, their relatives, their friends," Bao said.
Though economic reforms have raised the living standards of countless Chinese, Bao's views on corruption are not uncommon.
Millions have suffered during the era of reforms, including poor farmers taxed excessively by corrupt local officials and workers laid off from state-owned businesses run into the ground by corrupt bosses.
Their growing resentment of corruption has led to widespread disillusionment with the party, and Jiang and other top officials have undertaken a series of anti-corruption campaigns to bolster the party's image.
Jiang has also tried to broaden the party's appeal with an awkward theory called "The Three Represents," a plan to invite private businessmen into the party of peasants and workers. Jiang wants the doctrine written into the party's constitution at next month's 16th Communist Party Congress.
But the larger point of the plan is to help establish a legacy for Jiang. It hasn't taken hold with the Chinese, many of whom would have trouble naming even one "represent," despite relentless coverage and praise in state news media.
"It is extremely difficult for Jiang Zemin, despite all his efforts, to become someone like Mao Tse-tung or Deng Xiaoping," Cheng said. "But he still has a tremendous command over the resources of the propaganda machinery. He may not inspire people, but he can still do a lot to bore people."