Inside the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on May 14, Chinese President Xi Jinping posed a series of rhetorical questions to his American counterpart, President Donald Trump, who visited China on May 13-15: Can China and the United States overcome the Thucydides Trap and create a new paradigm of major-country relations? Can they meet global challenges together and provide greater stability for the world? Can they build a bright future together for their bilateral relations in the interest of the wellbeing of the two peoples and the future of humanity?

Some American observers heard in this an indirect barb: a subtle reminder that the U.S. is the declining power in Harvard professor Graham Allison's famous formulation. The interpretation is understandable but misplaced. Xi's invocation was neither a taunt nor a concession to inevitability. It was an invitation to transcend the very ontology that makes the "trap" thinkable, an ontology of atomistic states locked in zero-sum collision. In its place, Xi offered a different reading of Thucydides and a practical framework: "constructive strategic stability."

Reinterpreting the Thucydides Trap 

Allison's Destined for War (2017) popularizes the idea that a rising power must inevitably clash with an established one, drawing on ancient Greek historian Thucydides' account of the city states of Athens and Sparta. The Peloponnesian War (431-404 B.C.) between the two becomes a cautionary structural tale: Power transitions breed fear, miscalculation and conflict. This framing resonates with a strain of American political science realism, where states are billiard balls on a table, national interests emerge from relative power and diplomacy is largely about managing inevitable friction.

Yet, this flattens Thucydides. The History of the Peloponnesian War is not a manual of iron laws but a tragedy of human agency. Athens' downfall stemmed not from some impersonal structural destiny but from hubris, vanity and the failure of prudent statecraft. The Melian Dialogue recorded in the book, so often quoted for its brutal "the strong do what they can," actually illustrates the Athenian arrogance and its consequences. Thucydides chronicles how emotion, poor judgment and overreach turned potential coexistence into ruin. The lesson is the necessity of wise leadership and diplomacy, not the futility of avoiding conflict.

Xi's remarks align with this deeper reading. By posing the Thucydides question openly and then answering it with a call for a "new paradigm," he rejected fatalism. China does not subscribe to the view that conflict is structurally ordained. Instead, the emphasis falls on agency, mutual benefit and the cultivation of stability. This echoes longstanding Chinese philosophical and historical traditions that prioritize harmony amid complexity, the avoidance of luan (disorder), and the recognition that entities are interdependent rather than isolated.

Central to this is the notion of ni zhong you wo, wo zhong you ni—literally "you are in me, and I am in you." States are not detached atoms but intertwined. China's rise need not come at American expense; American rejuvenation ("making America great again") can coexist with Chinese development. Economic and trade ties are framed as mutually beneficial, not zero-sum. Disagreements are to be managed through "equal-footed consultation." This ontology underpins Xi's broader global initiatives over recent years—covering global development, global security, global civilizations and global governance, proposals that envision shared prosperity and stability rather than spheres of influence or hegemonic replacement.

Constructive strategic stability 

The operational mantra emerging from the summit, "constructive strategic stability," gives this flesh. As Xi described it, this means "positive stability with cooperation as the mainstay, healthy stability with competition within proper limits, constant stability with manageable differences and lasting stability with expectable peace." It is not a slogan but a call for aligned actions over the next three years and beyond.

This formulation deftly sidesteps the binary traps of great-power rivalry. It creates conceptual space for multipolarity without framing it as overthrow. For the U.S., it offers a path to adjust to a world of multiple centers of power with dignity, rather than through humiliating concession or desperate containment. No longer the undisputed hegemon, the U.S. is invited to partner in shaping a more distributed order. On the eve of its 250th anniversary in 2026, the question for the U.S. is whether it can redefine its role and identity accordingly.

Critics wedded to realist lenses may view this as rhetorical, sleight-of-hand masking Chinese ambition. They see spheres of influence, inevitable rivalry and the need for the U.S. to "win" by constraining China's rise. Yet such views risk becoming self-fulfilling. By assuming atomistic collision, they discount the very interdependence that already binds the two economies and societies. Supply chains, technology, markets and global challenges like climate change, health, AI and weapons proliferation do not respect realist abstractions. The "you in me, I in you" reality is empirical as much as philosophical.

Xi's move places the gauntlet in U.S. court. The high-level understandings reached in Beijing on a range of issues provide a platform. Implementation on the ground will test sincerity. The Taiwan question remains the most sensitive flashpoint, where Xi reiterated its centrality and the need for caution. Broader global issues, from the Middle East to Ukraine to the Korean Peninsula, demand coordinated or at least non-disruptive approaches.

The deeper test is cultural and intellectual. Can U.S. policymakers and strategists move beyond a Thucydides filtered through 20th-century realism to engage the historian's actual emphasis on statecraft, prudence and the perils of hubris? Allison's trap has shaped debate by suggesting structural doom; Xi's engagement suggests historical contingency and the possibility of wise choices. Trump, with his transactional style and focus on deals, may be better positioned than ideological predecessors to seize this opening. His reported respect for Xi and emphasis on mutual strength align with the non-zero-sum framing.

History offers precedents for peaceful power transitions, notably the U.S. and Britain in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Shared language, culture and economic complementarity helped. Today's U.S.-China relationship lacks those affinities but shares profound stakes in global stability. Interdependence raises the costs of conflict far beyond those in Thucydides' era.

As the U.S. approaches its semiquincentennial, reflection on foundational principles is timely. The republic was born asserting independence and self-determination, yet it has often projected a universal mission. A multipolar world tests whether the U.S. can champion its values and interests without demanding primacy. Redefining greatness in a context of equals would itself be an act of national renewal.

Xi's performance in the Great Hall was an exercise in statecraft. By invoking the Thucydides Trap only to transcend it, he created diplomatic space. He discarded the presuppositions of atomistic realism while extending an olive branch wrapped in strategic clarity. The binary logic of "win-lose" does injustice to what occurred; it was an invitation to co-create a different game.

Actions will speak louder than rhetoric. Trade teams have produced initial positive outcomes; military-to-military and diplomatic channels must deepen. Differences will persist and require management. Yet the conceptual direction has been laid: intertwined futures over colliding trajectories.

For Thucydides, the tragedy of Athens was not inevitable decline but the failure to match power with wisdom. Xi draws the lesson that statecraft—prudent judgment, restraint and foresight—offers escape. The U.S. now faces its own test. On its 250th anniversary, can it embrace a world where it remains indispensable but not singularly dominant? The summit in Beijing has created a window of both time and space. Whether that space is filled with constructive stability or renewed friction depends on choices in Washington where the "hawks" are always itching for a fight. History, as Thucydides knew, turns on such choices. BR

The author is an adjunct professor at Queensland University of Technology in Australia  

Copyedited by Elsbeth van Paridon 

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