This article analyses contradictions in the Thai engagement with UNESCO discourse by examining how concepts relating to Education for Sustainable Development and Global Citizenship Education have been interpreted in key national policies. Thai education policy discourse signals convergence with certain aspects of the international sustainability agenda while selectively excluding key elements in the name of Thai ‘tradition’. Crucially, the Sufficiency Economy Philosophy (SEP) is portrayed as a distinctively ‘Thai’ approach to modernisation, endorsing hierarchy and inequality. Divergent understandings of key concepts extend to contested notions of democracy, human rights, secularism, and moral education. Analysing these tensions in historical context, we trace the politics of education to Thailand’s semi-colonial past, before focusing on contemporary SEP discourse. In conclusion, we situate this case in a wider comparative frame, showing how Thai claims to uniqueness are, in fact, anything but unique.