DAR ES SALAAM: US–CHINA talks and high-level discussions among influential leaders might temporarily halt tariffs and reopen communication channels, allowing economies to return to normal, but in my view, competition persists.
Why? The global landscape is shifting towards a multipolar order, with chips, supply chains, security, critical mineral sourcing and climate issues remaining highly contested.
The results of consultations between UK-China, US-China, Russia-China, Pakistan-China, and potentially others in Beijing are unlikely to lead to a complete overhaul of the global order under a single dominant nation.
From an economic point of view, the world is more likely to shift towards a complex multipolar system in which influence is shared, negotiated, and contested across areas such as trade, technology, security, and climate change, rather than controlled by a single power.
Diplomatic negotiations between Washington and Beijing, impacting the world economy, rarely resolve their rivalry permanently.
Instead, they often result in brief easing of tensions, during which tariffs may be lowered, military hotlines are reopened and discussions about stability occur, even as the competition for influence persists underneath.
These meetings are less about reaching a peace agreement and more like a weather forecast: the storm persists, but its trajectory and form become more predictable.
Today, influence is more about control over the sourcing of critical raw materials, chips, supply chains, data, development loans, shipping lanes, and the definition of order than about the number of aircraft carriers and control of the sea routes.
As an economically sustainable superpower, China is increasingly influencing outcomes in these sectors.
Its expanding role in development finance and trade gives it leverage in decision-making centers, where strategic projects like roads, ports, or power plants are scrutinized.
In theory, this is an appealing idea. Who wouldn’t want affordable energy or quicker rail?
However, in practice, the situation is more complex. Infrastructure agreements often establish long-term economic ties with Chinese companies, prompting concerns about funding methods and transparency within policy circles.
Although Beijing’s approach appears pragmatic and transactional, certain experts caution that such arrangements might create uneven long-term economic dependencies among the involved parties.
The USA and its allies, by contrast, remain stronger in military reach, finances, and the dense web of alliances built over decades. US leadership is loud and visible: bases, exercises, sanctions and institutions that translate power into rules.
That style, to those unaware, creates predictability for friends and discomfort for rivals. It insists that the world adopt a vocabulary of freedom, open markets, and norms that implicitly preserve US primacy.
This insistence can be convincing as it ties power to principles; however, it may also foster resentment, particularly when US influence is frequently paired with normative and strategic reasons that critics often see as selective.
These options are not straightforward. China’s silent, project-focused diplomacy encourages countries to choose specific projects, while the USA often pushes for clearer alignment within its strategic framework. This distinction is important.
Many governments, especially in the Global South, including Tanzania, prefer having a choice of projects. Infrastructure and financial support address immediate needs better than high-level rhetoric.
China’s emerging institutions operate alongside a global system long shaped by the United States.
Beijing’s diplomacy remains selective; its governance and diplomatic standards are still evolving and have not yet gained broad international acceptance. Moreover, its model does not generate soft power like US culture and institutions once did.
As a result, China is gradually becoming a significant actor in influencing rules in major areas of global governance.
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This results in a world that defies a single dominant narrative. Instead of one empire, there will be overlapping spheres of influence. China might lead in trade with parts of Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
By contrast, the USA is expected to maintain its dominance in security and the global financial system.
The European Union could set regulatory standards that other nations would need to meet to access its markets.
Meanwhile, countries in the Global South, including Tanzania, will become more assertive in negotiations, securing concessions without fully pledging loyalty.
Leadership will shift from occupying a throne to earning enough trust to guide a room, a new skill distinct from commanding a stage. The consequence is pragmatic and messy: more negotiation, more hedging, more bargaining.
In all these ways, the emerging global order is expected to stay multiplex, influenced by several centers and continuous negotiation.
While this isn’t necessarily negative—diverse leadership can prevent abuses and provide alternatives—it also makes management more challenging.
In a busy market driven by ambition and distrust, stability depends more on interconnected agreements than on any single dominant deal.
Leaders should prioritize creating language and institutions that strengthen these agreement networks, remembering that in a networked era, power lacking approval is ineffective, and approval without trust is unstable.
A recently US–China meeting, or a similar one, can clarify these differences.
It can reduce tensions over specific crises without addressing the fundamental causes of rivalry; it can also create opportunities for cooperation on common threats such as nuclear proliferation or climate change, even though competition over technology, supply chains, and influence remains unresolved.
Technical agreements on hotlines and deconfliction help, but they do not resolve the strategic reasons behind the competition.
Therefore, such meetings are valuable as stabilising actions that offer immediate tactical benefits rather than transforming the overall relationship.
As an economic analyst, I find the idea of a single country leading the world increasingly anachronistic.
The history reminds us that in 19th- and 20thcentury templates, empires centred on capital cities and projecting uniform orders fit less well in an era shaped by networks, platforms, and transnational flows of capital and data.
When observing current global issues, power, especially economic power, resembles a web: interconnected nodes of influence across various domains.
These nodes sometimes cooperate, clash, or compete to sway small states and corporations.
In this multiplex, the ability to set rules and persuade others that these rules benefit them can be more important than raw power.
Beijing, which has recently attracted global attention as world leaders queued for consultations, faces the task of transforming leverage into genuine authority.
While it can offer scale and quick impact, legitimacy is rooted in stable institutions and convincing narratives.
At the same time, Washington should adapt its leadership approach to seem less hierarchical and more collaborative.
Both parties need to recognize that influence is now more often coming from the private sector and international organizations, rather than just from embassies and military assets.