FIIA director Mika Aaltola has re-appointed Bart Gaens to the project director position of FIIA’s Center on US Politics and Power (CUSPP) until August 2020, when the position becomes open through an in-house call. Bart Gaens is Senior Research Fellow at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, and has also worked as Project Director at the Center on US Politics and Power (CUSPP) since 2016. Furthermore, he is Adjunct Professor (Docent) in Japanese Studies at the University of Helsinki. Previously, he has worked as Professor of Japanese Studies at the University of Helsinki. He has published on Europe–Asia relations, with a special focus on the ASEM (Asia–Europe Meeting) process. Further research interests include Japan’s foreign policy, as well as security-related issues in East Asia.
The Director has also appointed Carla Norrlof visiting research professor for one year starting on January 1st 2020. Norrlof is Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Toronto. Her research is on theories of international cooperation with a special focus on great powers particularly US hegemony in the areas of money, trade and security. Majoring in economics (B.A.) and political science (M.A.), she graduated from Lund University. At the Graduate Institute of International Studies (Switzerland), she specialized in political economy and received a Diplôme d’Etudes Supérieures and a Ph.D degree in International Relations.