John Pomfret and Philip P. Pan on Jiang Zemin's victory over Li Ruihuan, who

is believed to have limited the crackdown on intellectuals after the suppression of the Tiananmen Square movement, and his brain trust was rumored to be planning to push limited political reforms at the National People's Congress after Jiang retired. A new book by an anonymous author who appears to be a former aide to Zhu Rongji and who says he had access to internal party personnel files describes Li as the senior Chinese leader most willing to talk about political reform, including expanding elections and reducing censorship of the state media....Li is also quoted promoting greater artistic freedom, urging the party to acknowledge and apologize for its errors, and criticizing party officials who "put themselves on display like flowerpots on a stand."

Too bad.

Update

John Pomfret and Philip P. Pan argue that Zeng Qinghong is another Chinese leader to watch.
upUpdate

China's top nine leaders