Deng Xiaoping met Margaret Thatcher in 1982 to negotiate the return of Hong Kong. Photo by Xinhua

Praise for late British prime minister's role in international affairs

Margaret Thatcher could prove to be one of the last great European leaders, says a former Chinese ambassador to Britain.

Ma Zhengang says such strong styles of leadership could only exist in harsh international environments like the Cold War. "To a large degree, she was a product of her time. Under the leadership of Thatcher, Britain played a much more significant role in that era disproportionate to its power.

"European leaders nowadays cannot be compared with leaders like Thatcher and Churchill," he says.

Many in China paid tribute to the role the former British prime minister, who died on April 8, played in international affairs. Her most direct impact on China was her negotiations with Deng Xiaoping over the handover of Hong Kong, which led to the joint declaration between Britain and China in 1984.

Shi Yinhong, professor of international relations at Renmin University of China in Beijing and one of China's leading foreign policy experts, believes this is one of her most lasting legacies.

"Despite many obstacles and arguments, the important thing is that Thatcher and Deng managed to make a pact on the Hong Kong question, having avoided chaos and animosity. This can be viewed as one of her greatest contributions to history."

Ma, who is also a former director of the China Institute of International Studies in Beijing, says Thatcher was pragmatic enough to realize Britain could not hang on to Hong Kong.

"Thatcher won the Falklands war with her toughness, defending the interests of the UK. But on the question of Hong Kong she quickly realized her usual toughness would not work. On the other side of the negotiation table was a rising China," Ma says.

"Thatcher was tough but Deng Xiaoping was tougher on getting back Hong Kong. She realized that she had to be practical and face the reality, and the best way to defend the UK's interests was to resolve the problem diplomatically with China."

Some in China believe Thatcher set an example with the privatization of British state-owned businesses she carried out in the 1980s.

China's economy remains dominated by large state-owned enterprises.

Zhang Weiying, professor of economics at Guanghua School of Management at Peking University and chief economist of the China Entrepreneurs Forum, says China should bring in similar market reforms.

"We can learn from Thatcher's privatization program to reduce state shares gradually", Zhang says. "If state control was brought down from 70 or 80 to 40 or 50 percent, it would still hold the biggest share but it would be an important signal about the direction in which the country was going."

Kerry Brown, executive director of the China Studies Centre at Sydney University and a former Asia specialist at the foreign policy think tank Chatham House, says her ideas about privatization did attract interest in China.

"Her embrace of a highly liberal market system, however, was always circumscribed in China by some complex discussions of the function of the state and central planning, and these continue to today," Brown says.

The former British foreign secretary Jack Straw, who was on a visit to Beijing this week, also paid tribute to the former prime minister. The Labour politician spent his early career on the opposition benches as she ruled supreme.

"She defined the age whether you liked her or not, and I was ambiguous about her. She was an extraordinarily powerful personality," he says.

The Hong Kong businessman and politician Paul Cheng, author of On Equal Terms: Redefining China's Relationship with America and the West, remembers Thatcher from a private meeting at Government House in Hong Kong when he was chairman of NM Rothchilds in Asia in the late 1990s.

"I could tell then that she was very determined and had her own convictions on certain issues," she says. "She is a historic figure, and she did many good things for the UK but obviously she was controversial on certain fronts."

(China Daily 04/12/2013 page25)