Dr. Alexandra M. Friede is a research assistant at the Chair of International Security Policy and Conflict Research at the University of the Federal Armed Forces in Hamburg. Her research focuses on national defense policies in the Baltic Sea region and alliance policy in the EU and NATO. In 2024, she was a visiting scholar at the University of Gothenburg, where she collaborated on the research project “Total Defense for the 21st Century: Civilian-Military Collaboration in Scandinavia.”