Patrick Quirk serves as Senior Director for Strategy, Research, and the Center for Global Impact at the International Republican Institute (IRI). In this role, he manages the team of thematic experts, researchers, and global project staff who help IRI monitor and develop innovative approaches to address global challenges to democracy. He also oversees IRI’s institutional efforts on monitoring, evaluation and learning, and applied research. Concurrent to serving at IRI, Dr. Quirk is a Nonresident Fellow in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution and an Adjunct Professor at Georgetown University.
Before joining IRI, Dr. Quirk served on the U.S. Secretary of State’s Policy Planning staff in the Department of State as the lead advisor for fragile states, conflict and stabilization, and foreign assistance. From 2018-2019, he conceptualized, and managed the process to advance, the new U.S. approach to fragile states. \
Prior to Policy Planning, he served in State’s Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations (CSO) as Senior Advisor for Policy and Strategy. In this capacity, he was the chief political scientist for, and a lead author of, the 2018 Stabilization Assistance Review (SAR) and led the team that conceptualized and institutionalized CSO’s approach to mitigate conflict surrounding elections and political transitions. From 2017-2018, he was a Nonresident Penn Kemble Fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).
Prior to government service, Dr. Quirk was a Research Fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States and a Senior Manager at Creative Associates International, where he led risk assessments for the U.S. government and managed democracy assistance and conflict prevention programs.
He is the author of Great Powers, Weak States, and Insurgency: Explaining Internal Threat Alliances, co-author of USAID’s Best Practices in Electoral Security, a Guide for Democracy, Human Rights and Governance Programming, and a lead author of State CSO’s Electoral Violence Assessment Framework assessment methodology.
Quirk earned a B.A. in History from Bates College and a Ph.D. in Political Science from Johns Hopkins University.