Senior Fellow, China and Geopolitics
Dr. Friso Stevens is a Chinese politics and foreign policy specialist at The Hague Centre for Strategic Studies, operating at the intersection of IR theory, military strategy, and foreign policy analysis.
His primary research agenda pertains to the debate on China’s resurgence, its strategic implications for the broader Indo-Pacific, and how socio-historical factors drive China’s quest for ‘national rejuvenation.’ Well-versed in Chinese elite politics and autocratic popular mobilization, Friso has a knack for deciphering the intricacies of CCP propaganda and organizational doctrine.
Other research interests include US foreign policy, the changing global power configuration and world order, European strategic autonomy and economic security, European naval strategy and the Joint Expeditionary Force, and the future of warfare amid new military technological innovations.
His work has been published in peer-reviewed journals such as The Pacific Review, Asian Security, Asian Affairs, Journal of Current Chinese Affairs, International Politics, and popular outlets such as ChinaFile, East Asia Forum, The Diplomat, Forbes, and The National Interest. Dutch media such as NRC Handelsblad, Trouw, Nederlands Dagblad, and NPO Radio 1 have interviewed him.
In March 2023, Friso earned a Ph.D. Degree in International Relations from Leiden University. In May 2025, this was published as a monograph with the Routledge Asian Security Studies Series under the title Chinese Assertiveness, Ideational Mobilization, and the Rise of Xi Jinping: Achieving Something.
From 2021 to 2023, he was a Max Weber Postdoctoral Fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies of the European University Institute in Florence, and a Postdoctoral Fellow in Asian Studies at the Department of Cultures, University of Helsinki, in 2023-2024.
From 2017 to 2020, Friso was a Lecturer in Political Science at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, where he taught qualitative research courses, diplomacy in East Asia, and supervised Bachelor’s and Master’s theses.
Friso holds Master’s Degrees in International Law (Vrije Universiteit and Northwestern University), International Security Studies (Vrije Universiteit), and International Relations (Peking University), a Bachelor’s Degree in Dutch and European Law (Vrije Universiteit), and a Postgraduate Certificate in War Studies (King’s College London).
