CHINA'S DENG DIES AT AGE 92 : KNOWN AS MODERNIZER, REPRESSOR.

Byline: Seth Faison The New York Times

Deng Xiaoping, one of the founding revolutionaries of Communist China and the architect of economic modernizations that transformed the world's most populous nation, died Wednesday night in Beijing. He was 92.

The official New China News Agency reported that Deng, who for the past 18 years was referred to as the paramount leader, died at 9:08 p.m., Beijing time (5:08 a.m. PST). He suffered from Parkinson's disease, the agency said, and died from ``complications of lung infections.''

As the sun rose on Beijing this morning, many residents learned the news on radio and television broadcasts before they set off for work and school, and the reaction of those on the street at dawn was restrained and, in some cases, nonchalant. It is part of Deng's legacy that ordinary people no longer hang on daily reminders of their leaders' every pronouncement.

Deng leaves behind his designated successor, Jiang Zemin, 70, China's president and general secretary of the Communist Party. He was chosen by Deng and other senior leaders in late June 1989, in the weeks after the crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators near Tiananmen Square, one of the darkest episodes of Deng's legacy, and yet one in keeping with his deep-seated reliance on authoritarian measures.

This morning, Jiang was quickly named chairman of a funeral committee, made up of 459 leaders of China's government, evidently formed long in advance of Wednesday night's news. No announcement was made about the timing or scope of a funeral.

Economic growth

A wily pragmatist, Deng led China to economic growth few Chinese had dreamed of, making the country much less prone to unrest than it might have been if Deng had died a few years earlier.

An unyielding authoritarian, he left behind a Communist Party that still has absolute political authority and crushes all dissent, even though its ideology has lost its legitimacy with most Chinese.

While many Chinese were prepared to some degree for Deng's death, it still leaves a void.

``I think for the steady development of our nation we can't be without him,'' said Yang Xiaoping, 39, a hotel attendant who was heading off to work. ``I am not totally shocked. In earlier years when Mao died, we all thought it impossible, and were shocked, and could not accept it.''

Others were divided over the changes Deng helped unleash.

``In the past everyone was equal,'' said Gao Yilun, a 64-year-old retired worker who repairs bicycles. ``Now even college graduates can't get a job.'' But he added, almost reflexively, ``It is not for us little people to talk about.''

Deng was the last of a generation of leaders who shared the hardships of forging a revolution, proclaimed the People's Republic of China in 1949, and presided over decades of drastic political upheaval.

The convulsions culminated in the Cultural Revolution, a movement that was initially endorsed by Deng but then toppled him as one of its chief victims. Only after he survived his political exile and brought the ideas of the market to a China founded on rejecting them did his policies help bring China a measure of prosperity and stability.

A charismatic, chain-smoking man who stood barely 5 feet tall, Deng was known for a personality as peppery as the cuisine of his native Sichuan province, and was given to punchy political pronouncements, like his well-known maxim for pragmatic economics: ``It doesn't matter whether a cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice.''

Deng formally retired from his last important post, chairman of China's central military commission, in 1989. Yet he continued to wield immeasurable influence, reserving final say in all important political matters for several years afterward, and finally relinquishing power only as he grew frail and disoriented.

Seamless transition

In his final public appearance in February 1994, Deng was visibly weak, walking only with assistance and extremely hard of hearing. Since then, while outsiders speculated about his steadily deteriorating health, Deng's slow retreat from political power allowed his successors to achieve an almost seamless transition.

Jiang, first seen as a transitional figure when he was named as Deng's heir apparent in 1989, has steadily asserted his authority in recent years, consolidating his influence over the military and China's enormous political bureaucracy.

Although Chinese long feared that Deng's death would leave the country prone to political chaos or even civil war, those worries receded noticeably in recent years. Deng's gradual disappearance, coupled with steadily growing standards of living, seem to have lulled ordinary people and Beijing's political elite into the belief that China's leadership would proceed without a major change in direction.

Yet the danger of unrest always lurks at times of transition in China. It was the death of a lesser senior leader of China in April 1989, the former Communist Party chief Hu Yaobang that unleashed vast demonstrations for a more open and accountable political system, as pro-democracy students used Hu's memorial services as an opening to air their grievances.

Extraordinary political circumstances - a gaping split between Deng and the the party chief at the time, Zhao Ziyang, once Deng's expected successor - allowed the demonstrations to swell. The crackdown that left hundreds dead on the streets and tarnished the image of China and Deng followed June 4, 1989.

This year, public expressions of grief for Deng are likely to be closely guarded, and any attempt to organize independent memorial services is likely to be suppressed with force, if necessary.

Deng's death also comes at a political moment strikingly different from that of September 1976, when Mao Tse-tung died at the age of 82. At that time, there was a sharp division between political radicals led by Mao's widow, Jiang Qing, and moderates, led by Deng.

Deng was not able to seize power right away, though, and Mao was replaced by Hua Guofeng, a middle-of-the-road compromiser, who was eventually edged aside by Deng in December 1978.

While once analysts thought that the same disorder and jockeying for power that followed Mao's death would occur after Deng died, Deng's long illness gave Jiang time to establish himself.

``The transition has been in place probably for three years,'' said James Lilley, a former U.S. ambassador to China. ``Jiang Zemin is a Deng selection.''

International recognition

One of Deng's great achievements was to open China to the outside world, encouraging young Chinese to study overseas, urging foreign businesses to invest in China, and ensuring that China joined the international community.

Deng oversaw the negotiations that led Britain to agree in 1984 to return its colony of Hong Kong to the sovereignty of China on July 1, 1997, and took many opportunities to proclaim that ``one country, two systems'' would guide a hands-off approach that would allow Hong Kong to preserve its capitalist economic system.

Deng often expressed his determination to visit Hong Kong for the hand-over, when meeting with visiting foreign leaders, some of whom were unsure whether to take him seriously. Not everyone expected him to live until 1997, and his death comes a little more than four months before one of the last colonies is handed back to China, an event that symbolized China's triumph over the humiliations that helped unleash the revolution Deng helped incite.

Deng's death comes at the beginning of a year of great political sensitivity in China. The hand-over of Hong Kong on July 1 will require careful attention of Beijing's leaders, and it will be followed a few months later by the Communist Party's 15th Party Congress.

Deng, who married three times, was born to a landowner in the southwest province of Sichuan on Aug. 22, 1904. In addition to his third wife, Zhuo Lin, Deng's survivors are his five children: the oldest, Deng Lin, an artist who has exhibited her work in New York and Paris; Deng Pufang, his paraplegic son, who for the past decade has worked on behalf of the handicapped in China; a second daughter, Deng Nan, a vice minister of the State Science and Technology Commission; his youngest daughter, Xiao Rong, who has served her father as a personal aide since 1989; and his youngest son, Deng Zhifang, who studied physics in the United States before returning in 1988 to enter high-profile business ventures.

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2 Photos

PHOTO (1) Deng Xiaoping meets with ex-President Nixon in Beijing in 1985. Deng, who died Wednesday, is credited with China's prosperity.

Associated Press

(2) Deng