Link: Guanxi — Wikipedia, the free ency­clo­pe­dia.

Guanxi (Sim­pli­fied Chi­nese: 关系; Tra­di­tional Chi­nese: 關係; pinyin: gūan xi), lit­er­ally trans­lated as “rela­tion­ship”, has been a cen­tral con­cept in Chi­nese soci­ety and describes a per­sonal con­nec­tion between two peo­ple in which one is able to pre­vail upon another to per­form a favor or ser­vice. The two peo­ple need not be of equal social status.

Via Patri­cia.