Christian Ifvarsson, Programme manager.
Experts involved in the Russia and Eurasia Studies Programme. All these experts speak Russian:
Johan Norberg, Deputy Research Director MSc in Business Administration and in Russian. Johan follows developments in the Russian Armed Forces.
Maria Engqvist, Junior Analyst, MA
Maria is a Slavist and follows the development of Russian security and domestic policy.
Johan Engvall, Analyst, PhD
Johan covers developments in Central Asia. He also follows Russia's efforts in military research and development (R&D).
Pär Gustafsson, Senior analyst
Pär holds a doctorate from Oxford University, UK, and has been a Russia observer since the 1990s. Dr. Gustafsson was awarded his degree for a thesis on formal and informal conflict resolution in the contemporary Russian economy. He held a postdoctoral position at the University of Uppsala and was a Senior Member of St. Antony’s College, Oxford. At FOI, Dr. Gustafsson is a Russian military & technology analyst and co-Editor (with Dr. Johan Engvall) of Russian military capability in a ten-year perspective – 2022 (forthcoming 2023).
Jakob Hedenskog, Deputy Research Director, MA - On leave.
Jakob is a Slavist and political scientist. He covers Russian foreign policy, the North Caucasus, Russian counter-terrorism, as well as countries and regions in Russia's neighbourhood, such as Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, the South Caucasus and Central Asia.
Jonas Kjellén, Military Analyst, Master of Social Science (PM)
Jonas follows different aspects of the development in the Russian Armed Forces.
Tomas Malmlöf, Researcher, MSc in Political Science and BSc in Economics.
Tomas follows developments in the Russian defence industry and Russian energy policies and also works on energy security and economic development in the Baltic region as well as Nordic defence cooperation.
Susanne Oxenstierna, Deputy Research Director, PhD
Susanne took her PhD in Economics at Stockholm University in 1991. She has worked with public sector reform in Russia and other East European countries for the last 15 years. Susanne’s current research centres on developments in the Russian economy and the defence economy sector.
Gudrun Persson, Associate Professor, Deputy Research Director
Gudrun covers Russian security policy and foreign policy, as well as Russian strategic military thought, and military reform.
Carolina Vendil Pallin, Deputy Research Director, PhD
Carolina covers Russian decision-making, domestic politics, as well as Russian military reform, cyber strategy and Russia’s relations with the EU
Fredrik Westerlund, Deputy Research Director, BA in both Law and Political Science.
Fredrik is currently writing a PhD thesis on modern Russian civil–military relations at the Åbo Akademi University in Finland. He focuses on Russian security policy and military strategy as well as nuclear weapons and is also one of the experts on the Armed Forces and the defence industry.