SI-014-04:
Economic Security & Strategic Industry Protection

Situation

Economic systems have become deeply intertwined with national security, yet policy frameworks often continue to treat them as separate domains. Globalization has increased efficiency and growth, but has also created strategic dependencies on external markets, supply chains, capital flows, and critical technologies.

Nations are increasingly exposed to economic coercion, trade disruptions, financial volatility, and foreign control over key industries. Strategic sectors—such as energy, food, semiconductors, logistics, finance, and digital platforms—are vulnerable to external influence, acquisition, or disruption.

At the same time, industrial policy and national security strategy are often misaligned. Economic development is driven by short-term growth objectives, without sufficient consideration of long-term resilience, sovereignty, and control over critical capabilities.

Shift
Economic policy must shift from a growth-centric model to a security-integrated economic architecture, where resilience, control, and strategic autonomy are embedded into national development.

Strategic industries must be identified, prioritized, and protected as national security assets, not just economic drivers. This includes ensuring domestic capability, reducing critical dependencies, and safeguarding key sectors from external vulnerabilities.

The focus shifts from maximizing efficiency to optimizing resilience and sovereignty, balancing openness with strategic control. Economic security becomes a core pillar of national security, fully integrated into the broader security architecture.

Advantage
Thailand has a diversified economic base spanning agriculture, manufacturing, services, and tourism, providing a strong foundation for building economic resilience.

Its position within ASEAN and global supply chains enables it to function as both a production hub and a regional connector. This creates opportunities to reconfigure supply chains, attract strategic industries, and strengthen domestic capabilities.

Furthermore, Thailand’s policy flexibility allows it to align industrial strategy with national security objectives, enabling a coordinated approach to economic development and protection.

Additional Structural Advantage
Thailand can leverage its existing industrial ecosystem, infrastructure, and regional connectivity to develop a strategic industry framework, including:

• identification of critical sectors (energy, food, digital, logistics, finance, advanced manufacturing)

• development of domestic capabilities and redundancy in key areas

• establishment of regulatory mechanisms to monitor and manage foreign ownership and influence

• integration of economic data and intelligence into NSOS for real-time risk monitoring

Additionally, public-private collaboration can be strengthened to align national priorities with industry development, ensuring that economic actors contribute to national resilience.

Implication
Without a clear economic security framework, the nation risks increasing exposure to external shocks, loss of control over critical industries, and reduced strategic autonomy.

This can lead to long-term vulnerability, where economic decisions are constrained by external dependencies and global volatility.

Conversely, a well-integrated approach enables the nation to achieve resilient growth, strategic independence, and enhanced global positioning. Economic strength becomes not only a source of prosperity, but a core pillar of national power and security.

Action Layer