2. Xi Jinping

Title: President of the People's Republic of China

Country: China

Age: 62

Xi Jinping, the general secretary of China’s Communist Party, has been labeled by many the most powerful Chinese leader since Mao Zedong. Considering the domestic grip he’s secured in just three years since becoming president of the world’s largest country — nearly 1.4 billion people — it’s hard to argue. Xi holds at least 10 titles governing the world superpower (some of which he created), overseeing everything from the military and the internet to the economy.

That economy has stalled, and the nation’s stock market endured a tumultuous summer requiring a bailout that may have topped $200 billion. Still, China’s growth in recent years puts it in elite company, and by one measure its economy even eclipses that of the US, according to the IMF.

Xi has fulfilled a vow to wage an extensive and controversial anticorruption campaign within the country. He has investigated hundreds of thousands of people and locked away some high-ranking party officials for life — his former political enemies among them.