DENG XIAOPING beyond any doubt will enter the lists of history's most important figures. He controlled the Communist Party's Politburo for more than 18 years: Although he had no formal position in his last years he was China's most powerful "ordinary party member".
Before Deng re emerged in 1977 - after being twice ousted during the Cultural Revolution - he had been circumscribed by Mao Zedong and found it hard to play an independent role. An evaluation of his merits has to begin after he gained control of the Politburo for himself in 1978.
In passing judgment on Deng, the comparison has to be with Mao, for they were China's biggest dictators. Deng had points of similarity and difference, of continuity and abrupt break with Mao's line.
Both were the products of the leadership system of the party, based on Leninist theory. This ensured that Deng would be conservative in politics. Out of Deng's famous Four Principles the most basic one was to "maintain the leadership of the party".
The great difference between the two was that Mao was basically a peasant revolutionary leader, and once he succeeded, he more or less became an emperor, distancing himself from the masses and from reality, becoming a lawless dictator, secretive and self regarding, putting forward a whole set of idealistic and left wing ideas.
Deng had studied in France in his youth, he had some understanding of modern ideas and the need for modernisation. After consolidating power in 1978, he weakened the grip of monolithic ideology and influenced growth of reform. He also overcame dogmatism in economic thought. This has led to the growth of a middle class and the emergence of a civil society and of distinct interest groups.
Could Deng have done more to promote political as well as economic reform? As a Chinese intellectual closely involved in theoretical discussions, I was able to observe the limits of his tolerance.
At the party's Third Plenum in 1978, when the reform policy was decided on, Deng proposed "liberating our ideas, using our brains, seeking truth from facts" and shaking off the fetters of absolute belief in Chairman Mao.
We intellectuals in the party were immensely encouraged by this. A conference was called early in 1979 to "discuss the principles of ideological work". We had lively discussion on how to liberate ideas and expand democracy.
To start with, Deng took this conference very seriously, read all the proceedings and said that it should focus on the question of democracy.
But then he visited the US and in February went to war with Vietnam. He was enraged when the war was criticised on Democracy Wall in Beijing. The Maoist ideologues (Hu Qiaomu and Deng Liqun) who were opposed to democracy made the most of this stressing the personal attacks made against Deng on some wallposters. They claimed that opposition to the party was worse than in 1957 (when intellectuals were encouraged to speak up in the Hundred Flowers period). They tried to incite Deng to launch another "anti rightist" movement to repress the critics.
Deng Ziaoping then asked Mr Hu and Mr Deng to draft his speech to the intellectuals' conference: this was the famous speech on Maintaining the Four Basic Principles" (of keeping to the "socialist road", upholding party leadership, etc) and it warned off the pro-democrats in the party. We were unprepared and did not know how to respond, so we just had to keep silent for a time.
The debate reopened in August 1980 with another speech by Deng on "reforming the party and the state". But he insisted that freedom of thought should not be allowed to subvert the Four Principles, and particularly the principle of party leadership. When it seemed to do so, he would then intervene as he did in 1981 (criticising a controversial film by Bai Hua) and in 1983 when he denounced "spiritual pollution". Again the intellectuals fell silent.
In 1984, when the party leadership took new decisions to promote economic reform, the need for political reform also grew and we intellectuals called for democratisation. But Deng came out against "liberalism", and the student democracy movement began to emerge in opposition.
Once again the conservatives put pressure on Deng, resulting in the dismissal of the pro reform party secretary general, Mr Hu Yaobang, in 1987. Again the pattern was repeated, leading eventually to the democracy movement in Tiananmen Square.
In the end, Deng remained part of the old vanguard of the Communist Party, dedicated like Mao to the party's dictatorship. We may conclude that Deng's "merits outweigh his faults" (the opposite verdict to that which must be passed on Mao) but political reform was his Achilles' heel until the end.