Mikael Wigell

Research Director
Expertise
  • International economic relations
  • geoeconomics
  • sanctions
  • hybrid threats
  • hybrid warfare
  • Chinese and Russian grand strategies
  • EU's external economic relations

Mikael Wigell is Research Director at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs and Adjunct Professor in International Political Economy at the University of Tampere. He belongs to the World Economic Forum Expert Network, currently curating the WEF’s Geoeconomics section. Wigell has also been a Member of the Development Policy Committee of the Finnish Government and Chairman of the Finnish International Studies Association. He earned his PhD at the London School of Economics and he has been a Visiting Fellow at the Changing Character of War Centre, Oxford University.

His work on great-power politics, geoeconomics, hybrid threats and the political economy of development has been published in top-ranked international academic journals such as International Affairs, World Development, The Washington Quarterly, Comparative Strategy, Democratization, Asia Europe Journal and Global Affairs. He has also written policy reports for the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Government of Finland, as well as a number of briefings for international organizations such as the World Economic Forum, the Japan Development Bank and the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung. He led the International Business Risk and Resilience Monitor-project funded by the European Commission, as well as the Nordic Security of Supply in an Age of Disruption-project funded by the Nordic Council of Ministers. His latest publication (ed. together with Mika Aaltola and Sören Scholvin) is Geo-economics and Power Politics in the 21st Century: The Revival of Economic Statecraft (Routledge, 2018; 2020).

Degrees

PhD, London School of Economics, 2011

Language skills
English, Finnish, Spanish, Swedish (working languages); French, German, Italian, Portuguese (receptive skills)
Positions of trust

Non-Resident Associate, European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats (Hybrid CoE), 2019-
Chairman, Finnish International Studies Association, 2017-
Senior Editor, Journal of Autonomy and Security Studies, 2017-
Vice-Chairman, Finnish International Studies Association, 2015-2016
Board Member, Development Policy Committee, 2014-2015
Board Member, Scientific Board, The Åland Islands Peace Institute, 2011-
Board Member, Editorial Board, Graduate Journal of Social Science, 2003-

Work experience

Visiting Fellow, Oxford University, 2018
Post-Doctoral Researcher, Academy of Finland, 2013-2016
Visiting Researcher, Finnish Institute of International Affairs, 2008
Visiting Researcher, Universidad Torcuato di Tella, 2005
Consultant, Development Bank of Japan, 2003
Teaching Assistant, Johns Hopkins University, 2002
Trainee, Council of the European Union, 2001

Education

PhD, London School of Economics, Department of International Development, 2011
LSc, Åbo Akademi University, Department of Political Science, 2003
Diploma, Johns Hopkins University, School of Advanced International Studies, 2002
MSc, Åbo Akademi University, Department of Political Science, 2001


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