Zhao Ziyang

Zhao Ziyang's record is measured in offices held and roads not taken rather than in trophies. He ran the Chinese government as Premier for seven years and led the party as General Secretary for two, the only figure of the reform era to hold both posts in succession. His Sichuan experiments in the 1970s became the template for national agricultural reform, and the saying that grew up around them, "Want to eat grain? Look for Ziyang," is still the shorthand for his reputation as the man who could make an economy work. What sets him apart is the end of the story: he is the senior leader who chose the students over the tanks, and the price was fifteen years of house arrest and removal from his own country's official history. That combination of high office and total erasure is rare, and it is why his name persists in scholarship and international media long after the state stopped using it.