Matti Pesu

Matti Pesu is a Senior Research Fellow in the Finnish foreign policy, Northern European security, and NATO research programme at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs. He has led multiple research projects analyzing Finland’s security policy and NATO policy. Since the beginning of 2023, Pesu has been leading FIIA’s Nordic network.

Pesu has worked at FIIA since 2017 as a Visiting Fellow, Research Fellow, and Senior Research Fellow. He has also worked at Tampere University, the European Commission, and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of Finland. In 2012–2018, he was actively involved in the leading Finnish online magazine on international politics, The Ulkopolitist, most recently as a Managing Editor.

He has published extensively on Finnish foreign, security and defence policy, defence cooperation, Northern European security, nuclear deterrence, NATO, and the development of Euro-Atlantic Security. He is a frequent commentator on matters related to his field of expertise in both Finnish and international media (i.e. BBC, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, The New York Times, Reuters, and Associated Press). Pesu’s analysis and research have been included in publications such as International Affairs, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, War on the Rocks, National Interest, and NATO Review.

Pesu completed his PhD in International Relations on the role of ideas in Finnish foreign policy at Tampere University in 2019.

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