Intellectual Potential of Human Capital as a Factor in Ensuring the Economic Security of the State

Abstract

The article examines the role of the intellectual potential of human capital as a system-forming factor in ensuring the economic security of the state. The author proposes an original interpretation of intellectual potential as the core of human capital, describing the society's capacity to create, reproduce and apply knowledge through cognitive skills, research capabilities, creativity, entrepreneurial thinking and technological adaptability. A distinction is drawn between intellectual potential as capacity and intellectual capital as an institutionalized asset of organizations. A structural analysis of the state's economic security is carried out, identifying the place of the intellectual component in investment-innovation security, technological sovereignty and competitiveness. Four causal channels of impact of intellectual potential on economic security are substantiated: innovative productivity and structural complexity of the economy, adaptability to shocks and crisis resilience, technological sovereignty as the ability to act within global value chains, and the quality of public governance and institutions. Based on RDNA3, UNESCO, Global Innovation Index and Eurostat assessments, the scale of losses and threats to Ukraine's intellectual potential under conditions of full-scale aggression is analyzed, including the destruction of educational and scientific infrastructure, forced displacement and erosion of R&D funding. It is shown that the structural weaknesses in converting intellectual potential into innovation outcomes would be a development problem in peacetime, but become a security problem in wartime. Strategic priorities for preserving and developing intellectual potential are defined according to the logic of 'retain – strengthen – return – integrate,' including European integration mechanisms of participation in Horizon Europe and the formation of innovation ecosystems as instruments of security-oriented economic policy.