The last time – in late 2008 – that economic peril was stalking the US and Europe, China marshalled the might of its state-directed economy and engineered a muscular rebound that led the subsequent global recovery. This time, though, Beijing is feeling a lot less muscular.

The exertion of its last effort has sapped internal resources so thoroughly that the pertinent question today is not whether China can once again guide the global economy away from the rocks but whether Beijing retains decisive control over its own economic levers.

The central frailty is financial. At no time over the past three decades of “reform and opening” has Beijing’s control over the supply and price of credit in its economy been so tenuous. The reasons for its enfeebled position derive from the state-centric nature of its 2009-10 stimulus. They also help explain why a repeat would be hard to pull off.