Katrina Kosec is a Senior Research Fellow in the Development Strategy and Governance Division at the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) where she is Theme Leader for Public Investment. She works at the intersection of political economy, development economics, and public economics. Her research focuses on the linkages between governance, public investment, and poverty. One strand of work investigates the impacts of decentralization and local political competition on welfare and poverty. A second considers individual aspirations, including what drives them and how they influence economic, political, and social behaviors and opinions. A third considers the drivers and impacts of migration. Katrina holds a Ph.D. in Political Economics from Stanford University, where she was a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow in Economics.