For those interested, the actual terminology is jus soli ("right of the soil") vs jus sanguinis ("right of the blood"). And I guess there are conditional & unconditional versions of each. Jus soli is associated with the U.S. and the rest of the Americas (some 30 out of the world's 194 countries) while jus sanguinis is prevalent most everywhere else. WRT Thailand, as most of the posting here bears out, citizenship is a matter of your parents' status ("blood") rather than where ("soil") you happen to be born. Many Americans admittedly do have problems understanding anything but jus soli, while some might even incorrectly speak of it as a human right.

has anyone whose child is in this situation tried to apply for Thai permanent residency PR? Citizenship is better, but if you could get PR with little hassle, that would be a start.

PR is a fairly in depth process that can take 4-7 years to complete. The very first hurdle is you need to have a work permit and pay taxes on 80,000 baht a month minimum for 3 full years.

has anyone whose child is in this situation tried to apply for Thai permanent residency PR? Citizenship is better, but if you could get PR with little hassle, that would be a start.

PR is a fairly in depth process that can take 4-7 years to complete. The very first hurdle is you need to have a work permit and pay taxes on 80,000 baht a month minimum for 3 full years.

I was referring to PR for the baby born in Thailand without Thai citizenship, not the parent(s).

has anyone whose child is in this situation tried to apply for Thai permanent residency PR? Citizenship is better, but if you could get PR with little hassle, that would be a start.

PR is a fairly in depth process that can take 4-7 years to complete. The very first hurdle is you need to have a work permit and pay taxes on 80,000 baht a month minimum for 3 full years.

I was referring to PR for the baby born in Thailand without Thai citizenship, not the parent(s).

If a child is born in Thailand and:

1. The child's parents are not Thai, or

2. The child's parents are not Permanent Residents of Thailand

Then the only way for the child to get PR is for their parent to get PR and also apply for PR for the child at the same time. Otherwise the child will have to wait until they are an adult, get a work permit and complete the PR process in their own right.

I've just re-read my post and it's not clear, so to clarify, option 1 above would mean the child had Thai citizenship from birth.

The only way for them to get PR is option 2.