Analysis: Under Jiang, China projected a more open image
With his death, former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin leaves behind a very different China than the one he tried to shape
He grinned, and — just eight years after the crackdown on democracy protesters in Tiananmen Square — the spectacle of China's ruler beaming and glad-handing people in the very heart of capitalism seemed at once charming and really, really odd.
It was an October morning in 1997 at the New York Stock Exchange, and Jiang Zemin, the powerful head of the Chinese Communist Party and government, was ringing the opening bell. “Good morning!” he boomed. “I wish you good trading!”
This was entirely in keeping with the image of Jiang, who died at age 96 on Wednesday a full generation after his rule and two Chinese leaders later. He leaves behind a country very different than the one he tried to shape. Now it's effectively Xi Jinping's nation — and a society in the throes of extraordinary protests against “zero-COVID” lockdowns that saw crowds in the streets of Beijing and Shanghai demanding an end to Xi's and the Communist Party's rule.
Jiang's death, smack in the middle of the most visible demonstrations since that 1989 bloodshed on Tiananmen Square, illuminates how much has changed between the China of the late 1990s and early 2000s — when he was at the height of his rule — and today's economic powerhouse and more powerful and dominant country.
