Patrick Honohan

Patrick Honohan joined the Peterson Institute for International Economics in March 2016 as a nonresident senior fellow. Honohan was governor of the Central Bank of Ireland and a member of the governing council of the European Central Bank from September 2009 to November 2015.

He came to that position from Trinity College Dublin where he was professor of international financial economics and development and where he has since become an honorary professor of economics.

Previously he spent 12 years on the staff of the World Bank as a senior advisor on financial sector issues. During the 1990s he was a research professor at Ireland's Economic and Social Research Institute.  In the 1980s he was economic advisor to the Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) Garret FitzGerald.  He also spent earlier spells at the Central Bank of Ireland and at the International Monetary Fund.

A graduate of University College Dublin, he received his PhD in economics from the London School of Economics in 1978. 

He has taught economics at the London School of Economics, at the University College Dublin, and as a visitor to the University of California, San Diego and the Australian National University as well as at Trinity College Dublin. He was elected a member of the Royal Irish Academy in 2002.

In recent years, Honohan's research has focused on monetary and financial sector policy.  His work on financial crises includes an evaluation of how different policy approaches have affected the overall cost of these crises in both developing countries and advanced economies.  He has also studied exchange rate regime choice.  Another research theme has been the access of low income households to financial services.  He is coauthor of Europe and the Transformation of the Irish Economy (2023), Finance for All? (2008), and Financial Liberalization: How Far, How Fast? (2006), Systemic Financial Crises (2005), and Finance for Growth (2001).

He has also published extensively on the Irish economy, recently focused on the Irish banking crisis of 2008–12 and the economic performance of Ireland in the euro area.  Previous work on Ireland analyzed the earlier fiscal crisis of the 1980s, performance in the European Monetary System, the role of multinational corporation profits, and the interaction of unemployment and migration.