Death of Deng Xiaoping

Death

Deng Xiaoping died in Beijing at 21:08 on 19 February 1997. That night the CPC Central Committee, the NPC Standing Committee, the State Council, the CPPCC National Committee and the Central Military Commission jointly issued a "Message to the Whole Party, the Whole Army and the People of All Nationalities", stating that he had died of respiratory and circulatory failure, "suffering from late-stage Parkinson's disease complicated by a lung infection", "aged 93" (by the traditional reckoning; born in 1904, he was 92). It called him "the chief architect of China's socialist reform, opening and modernisation, and the founder of the theory of building socialism with Chinese characteristics".

Deng had stepped down from his posts in stages: according to the obituary, the 13th Party Congress agreed that he would leave the Central Committee and the Central Advisory Commission, and the Fifth Plenum of the 13th Central Committee accepted his resignation as chairman of the Central Military Commission. In early 1992 he toured the south and gave his celebrated talks, and in 1993 he oversaw the editing of the third volume of his Selected Works. The obituary credited him with a "decisive role" in the "smooth transition to the third-generation central leadership with Comrade Jiang Zemin at its core".

Funeral Arrangements

The Deng Xiaoping Funeral Committee's Notice No. 1 of 19 February ordered flags at half-mast at Tiananmen, Xinhuamen, the Great Hall of the People, the Foreign Ministry, embassies abroad and the Xinhua branches in Hong Kong and Macau until the memorial meeting, and stated that, "in accordance with Chinese practice", foreign governments, parties and friends would not be invited to send delegations. Notice No. 2 of 20 February announced a memorial meeting of 10,000 people in the Great Hall on 25 February, flags at half-mast nationwide and three minutes of sirens at 10 a.m., and said that "in accordance with Comrade Deng's wishes and the views of his family, there will be no ceremony to view the body".

The Memorial Meeting

The memorial meeting was held in the Great Hall of the People on 25 February and broadcast live on national radio and television; Jiang Zemin delivered the eulogy. Echoing Deng's own verdict on Mao, it said that "without Comrade Deng Xiaoping, the Chinese people would not have their new life today, and China would not have today's new situation of reform and opening". Both the obituary and the eulogy referred to the "political disturbances" of the late 1980s and early 1990s, saying that the Party and government, "with the firm support" of Deng and "other veteran comrades", had "resolutely upheld the Four Cardinal Principles". The obituary also noted that under the Sino-British and Sino-Portuguese agreements "Hong Kong will soon return to the motherland" — which it did on 1 July that year.

Ashes Scattered at Sea

According to Xinhua, Deng had repeatedly instructed his family to "donate his corneas, dissect his body for medical research, keep no ashes and scatter them at sea". On 2 March 1997, with flags at half-mast at Zhongnanhai, Hu Jintao and other central leaders, together with Deng's widow Zhuo Lin and other relatives, escorted his ashes and scattered them at sea.

International Reaction and Assessments

In a statement on 19 February, US President Bill Clinton called Deng "the driving force behind China's decision to normalize relations with the United States", said his 1979 visit "laid the foundation for the rapid expansion of relations and cooperation", and said a China "that is stable politically and open economically, that respects human rights and the rule of law" was in America's and the world's interest. Western assessments diverge: some stress that he integrated China into the global economic order and launched decades of rapid growth while arguing that his suppression of the 1989 demonstrators kept China's political system from modernising alongside its economy, leaving a "mixed" legacy; Ezra Vogel's 2011 biography is widely seen as authoritative, but reviewers have criticised its thin coverage of 1989 and its "hagiographic tone".