Economic Intelligence: An Operational Concept for a Globalised World

Economic security policies consist in the prevention and avoidance of all situations that can disrupt the life of either companies or States. In France, economic security is seen through the prism of ‘economic intelligence’, which aims to encompass all aspects of globalised risks and opportunities.

State security policies are widening their scope far beyond the military aspect, while more and more companies include security concerns in their strategies and management. In broad terms, economic security policies consist in the prevention and avoidance of all situations that can disrupt the life of companies or States and their success depends on their ability to anticipate, imagine new schemes, adapt norms and structures to the changes and to build networks of competences and co-operation, particularly between the public and private sectors but also between States sharing the same general interests. Economic security and economic intelligence must not be understood as purely defensive, as a withdrawal into one’s shell, but as the first step for building active policies and alliances, the latter being a pre-requisite to act and seize opportunities in our globalised world. This ARI is based on the author’s contribution to the Panel on Economic Security at the seminar organised by the Elcano Royal Institute on 28 June 2010 to support the preparation of Spain’s Spanish Security Strategy. At the seminar she gave an account of France’s approach to economic security and economic intelligence.