Since defending his PhD dissertation The True Colors of Finnish Welfare Nationalism in October 2015, Niko Pyrhönen has worked as senior researcher in the Finnish Institute of Migration and postdoctoral researcher at the Swedish School of Social Science. His current research project, funded by Helsingin Sanomat foundation and Kordelin foundation, deals with right-wing populist hybrid media mobilization practices and narratives in the 'alt-right' news outlets in the United States, France and the Nordic countries.

Pyrhönen started in CEREN in 2008 as researcher in the Academy of Finland's project Challenging Power. While working in the project, he received his Master’s degree in political science in March 2009. In his Master’s thesis, Pyrhönen explored how paradigmatic divisions within immigration and citizenship studies result in a relative weakness in transcending the gap between academic and practical political discourses. 

The doctoral research he conducted for the Challenging Power focused on constructions of national identity in face of increasing heterogeneity and the consequent welfare state-relevant implications for the regimes of recognition and the redistribution. He has also been teaching in the Master's Degree Program in Ethnic Relations (ERI).