Thailand and Its Development Strategies under USA-China Power Rivalry: The Difficulty of Balancing Influence and Hedging

Abstract The relations between the United States and China is currently changing into a more aggressive competition, with the US seeing China’s rise as a force that diminishes its role as a superpower reshaping the world order. With the current US-China relationship, Thailand is sandwiched in a dilemma of how to best balance the influence of the two superpowers and to hedge to avoid embarrassment or the possible effects of drawing too close to either one. Thailand has emphasized its policy of being neutral or as a “buffer state,” hedging between China and the US economically and politically – a policy it employed during the colonization of Indochina and the Second World War. Through this strategy, Thailand has been able to maintain a political and economic balance with the two superpowers as it did in the past and benefit from its role as an important geopolitical link of China and the United States. Nevertheless, Thailand faces the challenge of balancing influences as it invokes old policies to survive being torn apart in new rivalries.