Dukakis Center hosts American University scholar James Quirk
As it wraps up its 25th anniversary season of public service initiatives this semester, the Dukakis Center has returned to hosting short-term visiting fellows from select partner institutions for short periods. The Center's first such visitor was Dr. James Quirk, Professorial Lecturer in Politics at American University (AU), who spent the first week of March 2025 in residence.
The Dukakis Chair's original function was to host a visiting academic or practitioner for an extended period, even a full academic term. Thus, ACT hosted former White House Science Advisor Eugene Skolnikoff of MIT (Fall 2000) and James Veras, sometime Corporate Vice President of Ford Motor Company and founding President of the World Environment Center (Fall 2001). When it was recognized that this practice of hosting long-term fellows was unworkable, it became the practice to host short-term fellows, who were occasionally offered accommodation on campus in the Morley House attic. Among those visiting ACT in this capacity were Suhnaz Yilmaz of Koç University, Alan Cafruny of Hamilton College, Richard Katula of Northeastern University, retired US Ambassador to Greece Monteagle Stearns, and retired US Ambassador to Senegal Harriet Elam-Thomas.
Later, after the Chair had been transformed into a collegiate center, local figures of some renown were invited to serve as Dukakis Professor, most notably Simon Benssason, who recently retired from the European Commission. Several guests have conducted Dukakis Masterclasses since 2014, including Michael Dukakis himself.
Having emerged from the COVID-19 pandemic in 2023-24, the timing was considered ripe to resume hosting colleagues short-term from select partner schools such as Northeastern and American Universities, in order in part to enhance these institutional partnerships.
As fortune would have it, the Dukakis Center hosted three interns from American University in 2023-24. One of them, Jack Roberts, was invited to canvas and identify faculty at AU who might be of interest to the Center as short-term fellows (4-8 days). Dr. Quirk was selected notably for his experience studying Balkan politics (he taught for a year in Bulgaria) and his capacity as a student of comparative politics to speak meaningfully about both American and European politics.
During his residence, Dr. Quirk made an impromptu visit to Dr. Wisner's course in applied ethics to join a comparative discussion on the ethics of Hobbes' social contract theory and Realist IR theory. He then featured in Dr. Mavrikos's European Studies 211 class for a wide-ranging debate on foreign policy making in the US and the EU.
Finally, Dr. Quirk had dinner at the Queen Olga residence hall with a dozen AU study abroad students currently attending classes at ACT, an outing facilitated by ACT's student services department. Earlier, he had met with ACT Provost Stamos Karamouzis for a review of the ACT-AU study abroad partnership.
Dr. Quirk is the first of two colleagues from American University to be invited to help celebrate the Dukakis Center's silver jubilee season of public service initiatives this year. Later this spring, on April 30, Professor Sarah Snyder of AU's School of Global Service will deliver a Dukakis Lecture on the educational activities of American civilian expats in late Ottoman Asia Minor.
Dr. David Wisner, Executive Director, Michael and Kitty Dukakis Center for Public and Humanitarian Service, ACT, Dukakis Center, with Dr. James Quirk, Professorial Lecturer in Politics at American University (AU)
