The relationship between the United States and China has become one of the most consequential of the twenty-first century. It is no exaggeration to suggest that its trajectory will play a decisive role in shaping the emerging global order.The most recent US-China summit in Beijing was significant not only because it offered a tentative roadmap for managing bilateral tensions through the strategic concept of “constructive relationship of strategic stability”, but also because it has generated a wave of commentary on what this relationship means in an era increasingly characterised by global disorder. Much of the mainstream analysis tends either to focus on the personalistic dimensions of the relationship or to treat it as a largely diplomatic exercise between two great powers.What is often missing is a sustained engagement with the structural undercurrents shaping this transformation in the international system. It is these deeper dynamics that condition the behaviour of both states and, ultimately, the contours of their interaction. To understand this, it is worth revisiting the largely overlooked work of the Spanish journalist Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, a figure whose insights, while rooted in Spain’s democratic transition, offer unexpected analytical purchase for a global relationship far removed from Spanish domestic politics.The origins of the idea of a ‘correlation of weaknesses’Vázquez Montalbán was a perceptive and critical observer of Spain’s post-Franco transition. Reflecting on the process in a 2003 interview, he argued that when Franco disappeared, Spain did not experience a “correlation of forces”, but rather a “correlation of weaknesses”. By this he meant that none of the actors involved in the transition was in a position to impose its maximal political project; instead, all were constrained to negotiating within the limits of their respective vulnerabilities. Each side, in effect, sought to have its weaknesses recognised and managed within the emerging settlement.Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty.In practice, this meant that the Francoist regime could no longer reproduce itself in its previous form, but neither could the democratic opposition impose its programme of “democratic rupture”. The result was a negotiated transition that bore the hallmarks of what Antonio Gramsci would describe as a “passive revolution”, the effects of which continue to shape Spain today and, paradoxically, constrain its capacity to respond to the structural shifts of the current age of global disorder.How can this idea of a “correlation of weaknesses” explain the current situation between China and the US?US-China transnational elite networks: deals to buy time?For some time, several colleagues have been developing a Gramscian–Kautskyan approach to understanding US-China relations – one that foregrounds elite power, class alliances and the interdependence and interpenetration of capitalist states, alongside the tensions these dynamics generate. It is within this broader context – and against the backdrop of what might be described as a “correlation of weaknesses” – that we should situate the emerging framework of a US-China “constructive relationship of strategic stability” proposed by both sides in Beijing this month.Also read: ‘Chess Piece’ to ‘Blood Bag’? What Trump-Xi Summit Could Spell for IndiaWe suggest that this framework has become possible precisely because neither state is in a position to impose its maximal political project. This was one of the key lessons of how the US-China trade war unfolded. Rather than reflecting a settled hierarchy, the current configuration reveals a situation in which both powers are constrained to negotiate within the limits of their respective vulnerabilities.For the Trump administration, the imperative is to demonstrate that the United States still possesses the capacity to “win” in a geopolitical environment shaped by successive setbacks – including the conflict with Iran and the failures of the trade war – that could otherwise damage Republican prospects in the forthcoming midterm elections. For China, by contrast, the priority is to project an image of stability and control at a time when the wars in Ukraine and Iran have already exposed the limits of its capacity to shape outcomes abroad.While both sides benefit from an ecosystem of commentators and cheerleaders who tend to inflate their respective strengths, the reality is more restrained: both Beijing and Washington appear, at least in this context, to have an interest in having their weaknesses recognised and managed rather than denied.However, despite these structural weaknesses, US-China transnational elite networks continue to benefit significantly from this correlation of weaknesses, as it sustains forms of elite engagement across key strategic industries that are themselves shaped by intensifying international competition between firms. Intra-elite arrangements, such as those evident in the most recent Beijing summit, may thus function as a compensatory mechanism for a structural problem that is likely to require time – and sustained political adjustment – to resolve in a more decisive manner.The alternative, however, would be a far more destabilising rupture, should either side conclude that only confrontation could break the underlying deadlock.A global disorder fuelled by a ‘correlation of weaknesses’The challenge posed by this “correlation of weaknesses” between the United States and China is that while it may crystallise into a framework for managing great-power rivalry, it also spills over into a wider set of domestic and international dynamics emerging in this new age of global disorder. This is because the stabilisation of such a correlation necessarily entails a broader reorganisation of relations structured around it.It is no coincidence, for instance, that shortly after the Trump-Xi summit in Beijing, Vladimir Putin visited the Chinese capital. In this sense, the emergence of global disorder is not, at this stage, best understood as a struggle between great powers for future hegemony. Rather, it reflects a series of overlapping attempts by multiple actors to navigate the constraints imposed by this broader “correlation of weaknesses.”Escaping the ‘correlation of weaknesses’ in an age of global disorderWhile the United States and China may have established a working framework for managing their bilateral relationship, it is difficult to see this as the end of great power competition. Rather than framing US-China dynamics as a struggle for global dominance, or as an exercise in avoiding the so-called Thucydides Trap through deterrence and denial, we might instead understand them as a competition to escape this “correlation of weaknesses”.Also read: Trump‑Xi Summit Will Be No ‘Nixon in China’ Moment – That They Are Talking Is Enough For NowBoth powers are now mobilising state capacity and transnational elite networks in an effort to generate the domestic and structural conditions needed to break out of this strategic deadlock, in a context in which both sides seek to maximise their respective regimes of wealth accumulation. This is becoming increasingly difficult due to the dynamics of a global economy that imposes clear limits on these processes, thereby adding complexity and potentially further destabilising them. This helps explain the emergence of a simultaneously cooperative and conflictual relationship between the two great powers.But this involves more than relative power shifts. It requires overcoming a condition that has, paradoxically, been sustained by dense transnational elite networks linking the two countries since the 1970s – networks that have at times helped to manage rivalry, while simultaneously reinforcing the equilibrium they now seek to transcend. The current interregnum – whose duration is uncertain and ultimately unknowable – will, in this sense, be a struggle over how, and whether, this “correlation of weaknesses” can be overcome.As Montalbán, an avid reader of Gramsci, reminded us, Spain did not experience a fundamental rupture in its political order after Franco’s death, but rather a process of transformation. Perhaps that is what lies ahead here too, although transformation does not always resolve underlying structural challenges.Ferran Perez Mena is Assistant Professor of the International Relations of East Asia at Durham University. His research focuses on transnational elite networks and elite studies in world politics, China-West transnational elite networks, and China in the Global South. He is the author of numerous articles and a book, Contender States and Modern Chinese International Thought (2024).Inderjeet Parmar is a professor of international politics and associate dean of research in the School of Policy and Global Affairs at City St George’s, University of London, a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences, and writes the American Imperium column at The Wire. He is an International Fellow at the ROADS Initiative think tank, Islamabad, on the board of the Miami Institute for the Social Sciences, USA, and on the advisory board of INCT-INEU, Brazil, its leading association for study of the United States. Author of several books including Foundations of the American Century, he is currently writing a book on the history, politics and crises of the US foreign policy establishment.