Chinese President Jiang Zemin will step down from his position as Communist Party general secretary next month and from the presidency in March. During his 13 years in power, Jiang, 76, helped open trade relations and spark development in his country.

At the same time, he worked to improve relations with the U.S. despite the controversy last year over a U.S. spy plane in China, continued tension over Taiwan and criticism of China's human rights record. He accomplished all of this while maintaining his country's Communist identity in a world in which many Communist governments have crumbled.

What happens after Jiang leaves office will shape the future of the nation of 1.2 billion people (more than four times the population of the U.S.) and one of the largest markets in the world.

Third generation of Communism

Jiang is considered the "third generation" of Communist leaders following in the footsteps of revolutionary Mao Zedong, founder of the People's Republic, and his successor Deng Xiaoping, a reformer.

Jiang came to power in 1989, while China faced rising inflation, crime and corruption. It was the year the government brutally cracked down on thousands of students gathered in Beijing's Tiananmen Square for a pro-democracy protest.

The current leader at the time, Deng Xiaoping needed to find someone new to lead the Communist Party, and Jiang, who was the mayor and party chief in Shanghai, where a large pro-democracy demonstration ended peacefully, fit the bill.

"He came into power in very unsettled circumstances," said Dali Yang, a China expert at the University of Chicago.

Road to Reform

Trained as an engineer, Jiang studied economics in the former Soviet Union. Jiang has been regarded as a practical leader whose main priority was to maintain stability, continue with economic reforms and ensure that the Communist Party remains in power despite China's rapid modernization.

As president, he worked to have China accepted into the World Trade Organization. The U.S. Chinese Embassy reports that the economy is rising, technology and communication is improving and college enrollment in the past decade has risen from 600,000 to nearly 2.7 million.

But groups like the Human Rights Watch say Internet censorship, lack of HIV/AIDS information, and most importantly Jiang's record on human rights remains abominable.

In a NewsHour interview, Jiang said that human rights should fit the national conditions of each country.

"I believe that China does not feel that it has done anything wrong in the field of human rights," Jiang said. "China has a tradition of 5,000 years, and different countries have their different history and culture."

Tiger on the Brink

In 2008, China will host the Olympics, and, by that point, a new president will have no doubt begun a legacy. Chinese Vice President Hu Jintao, also considered a reformer, is expected to succeed Jiang.

In his book Tiger on the Brink, Jiang Zemin and China's new Elite, Bruce Gilley writes that Jiang distinguished his presidency from his predecessor's by unifying his power and establishing his own authority.

"Deng's single-minded focus was the economy -- reforming the economy, righting the wrongs of the past and trying to make the Chinese people a little better off," Gilley wrote. "What Jiang has done is not to negate anything that Deng did on the economic front, but rather to bring back into the spotlight other issues such as morality, patriotism, fighting corruption in the party, raising educational levels of cadres."

In what may be his final diplomatic visit to the United States, Jiang said last week that China had entered "a new stage of openness." He promised that China would continue with efforts aimed at "combating transnational crime, promoting global and regional economic growth and fighting terrorism."

by Raven Tyler, NewsHour Extra