Sarah Petrin is a Senior Advisor at I4DI, where she brings over 25 years of experience at the intersection of humanitarian response, foreign policy, and philanthropic strategy to help clients navigate complex donor landscapes and translate policy priorities into effective programming. She is the rare advisor who has operated on all sides of the table — leading programs in conflict zones, shaping policy in Washington, advising military and multilateral institutions, and mobilizing major donor resources — giving her an unusually complete view of how development and humanitarian investments actually move from strategy to impact.
Sarah’s career began in the field — managing UNHCR protection programs for 500,000 internally displaced people across Afghanistan, supporting relief operations in Mozambique and Ethiopia with World Vision in South Africa, and working on refugee policy from the ground up. She then moved into the policy and advocacy arena in Washington, serving as Director of Government Relations at the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, where she drafted legislative proposals, passed appropriations amendments, and led assessment teams for the Southeast Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina responses. At the International Committee of the Red Cross, she served as Senior Advisor to the Executive Branch during a presidential transition, briefing White House, NSC, and Cabinet-level officials on civilian protection and international humanitarian law. She went on to serve as a Senior Civilian Advisor to NATO’s Protection of Civilians concept development team and as a Peace Operations and Human Security Analyst at the U.S. Army’s Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute.
Sarah founded Protect the People, a consulting organization and nonprofit that provided civilian protection expertise to government agencies and built private sector partnerships for disaster response. She has served as a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, Senior Director of Consulting at the Center for Disaster Philanthropy, and Interim Vice President at the Truman National Security Project. She is the author of Bring Rain: Helping Humanity in Crisis, which draws on her work in 20 countries, and currently serves as President of the Board of the World Affairs Council of Maine.
Sarah holds a Master’s degree in Forced Migration and Refugee Studies from the University of Oxford, a B.A. in International Relations, French, and African Studies from Gordon College, and a certificate in Comparative Political and Economic Systems from Georgetown University.
