Profile

Hao Nan is a Geneva-based policy researcher and International Geneva Peace Fellow at the Geneva Graduate Institute, affiliated with the Institute Directorate and Centre on Conflict, Development and Peacebuilding (CCDP). His research examines the strategic agency of middle powers amid geopolitical rivalry, geoeconomic fragmentation and geotechnological competition, with particular interests in economic security and geoeconomics, nuclear security and geopolitics, and the emerging international order around artificial intelligence. His current work in Geneva explores how middle powers can mobilise issue-specific capabilities and exercise strategic agency through functional multilateralism to preserve cooperation and generate peace-relevant effects.

His professional and academic experience spans China, Singapore, India, South Korea, the Philippines, the United Arab Emirates and now Switzerland. He has worked across intergovernmental organisations, strategic-policy think tanks, multinational businesses and geopolitical risk consulting, including the Trilateral Cooperation Secretariat in Seoul, the ASEAN-China Centre in Beijing and the Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research in Abu Dhabi. He holds graduate degrees in public policy, international law and Middle Eastern studies from the National University of Singapore, Université catholique de Louvain and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

He is an Asia 21 Fellow, Nuclear Futures Fellow and Susan Strange Associate Fellow in Economic Security, and has participated in networks including the Arms Control Negotiation Academy, BASIC Emerging Voices Network and Pacific Forum. His analysis has appeared in Nikkei Asia, South China Morning Post, East Asia Forum, The Business Times and ThinkChina, and he has been interviewed or cited by outlets including the BBC, Reuters and Channel NewsAsia.

Current fellowship research project: Middle-Power Strategic Agency and Functional Peacemaking. During his fellowship, Nan is developing a broader research and convening agenda on middle-power strategic agency, functional multilateralism and the role of International Geneva in sustaining cooperation amid geopolitical rivalry, geoeconomic fragmentation and geotech competition.

THEMATIC EXPERTISE

• Middle power
• Economic security and geoeconomics
• Nuclear security and risk reduction
• AI governance
• Great power competition
• East Asian security and regional cooperation
• Gulf security and regional cooperation.
   

GEOGRAPHICAL EXPERTISE

• East Asia (China, Korean Peninsula and Japan)
• Southeast Asia
• UAE and the Gulf

RECENT PUBLICATIONS
 

“Beyond the Trade War: U.S.-China Competition and Triple Multilateralism in the Asia Pacific,” China Focus, UC San Diego, 2026 — Jimmy Carter Prize Runner-Up.

“From Sadaejuui to Strategic Agency: A South Korea Imagined in Triple-Trilateral Northeast Asia,” National Committee on American Foreign Policy, 2026.

“Middle powers don’t have to wait for a Trump-Xi-Putin summit,” South China Morning Post, 2026.

“The Security-Obsessed Global Economy Needs Its Own Helsinki Process,” South China Morning Post, 2026.

“As US and China compete over AI, middle powers can craft a third path,” South China Morning Post, 2026.

“How Switzerland Turned China’s Europe Problem into Leverage,” ThinkChina, 2026.

“Rewiring: Artificial Intelligence and Power in Global Politics,” Valdai Discussion Club Report, co-author, 2026.

“The Iran-Israel Standoff: Deterrence Breakdown and Nuclear Escalation,” Arms Control Negotiation Academy, co-author, 2025.