Dr. Niklas Swanström is the Executive Director of the Institute for Security and Development Policy, and one of its co-founders. He is a Fellow at the Foreign Policy Institute of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS).

His main areas of expertise are conflict prevention, conflict management and regional cooperation; the Korean Peninsula, Chinese foreign policy and security in Northeast Asia; Indo-Pacific, the Belt and Road Initiative, traditional and non-traditional security threats and its effect on regional and national security as well as negotiations. He is frequently interviewed by international media on his topics of expertise.