From April 2020 to March 2023 he was Senior Advisor to Mary Lawlor, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders.

He is the author of several books[6] about civil rights and U.S. politics, and had early experience on the Hill, interning for Senator Edward Kennedy in the mid-80s as a legislative researcher, contributing to what ultimately became the 1986 Anti-Apartheid Act.

His work for Amnesty International included being on research teams sent to conflicts in Lebanon 2006 and Gaza 2009, and on the ambassador of Conscience Award project for Nelson Mandela in 2005.

In February 2022 The Oxford Middle East Review profiled Dooley on four decades of activism and his approach to human rights work.

[26][27] In September 2014 an article he wrote about Bahrain for Defense One[28] was featured by the Washington Post editorial board in a piece on U.S. Imperfect Allies in the Middle East[29] and by the Aspen Institute as a Best Idea of the Day.

[36][37] In November 2018 he wrote a policy briefing for the Project on Middle East Democracy (POMED) "No Applause For Bahrain's Sham Election,"[38] which was the subject of a UN Dispatch podcast.

[40] In March 2022 he wrote a piece for POMED on the Biden administration's limp response to Bahrain's continuing human rights abuses.

In August 2017 he authored a report and op-eds detailing continuing human rights abuses in Egypt, including the radicalization of prisoners by ISIS in Egyptian jails.

[57] In August 2023 he wrote a report for Human Rights First on the tenth anniversary of the Rabaa massacre, citing the views of Egyptian activists on a decade of U.S. policy failure.

[68] [69] In 2024 he wrote for Irish America (magazine) on the 50th anniversary of the IRA bombing of pubs in Guildford and Birmingham, and the subsequent miscarriages of justice, and the continuing campaigns for the truth.

[75] In June 2023 he returned to the border with Belarus to detail in a report with Maya Fernandez-Powell for Human Rights First further attacks on activists,[76] and also wrote a blog for the Mitchell Institute at Queen's University Belfast on the issue.

[84] 2022: In March, following the Russian invasion, Dooley brought bulletproof vests and helmets to volunteer medics in Ukraine, and wrote a series of pieces on the views of local Human Rights Defenders.

[91][92] In August he again reported from Kharkiv near the Russian border about rocket attacks on the city,[93] and how local LGBT activists were part of the mass civilian mobilisation effort.

[101] In February he wrote a report on Ten Ways the U.S. Can Help Ukraine's Civil Society,[102] and co-authored an oped with prominent Ukrainian activist Olha Reshetylova for The Hill.

[103] In March he reported on attacks on medical facilities for Human Rights First and for the Mitchell Institute at Queen's University Belfast on difficulties facing local activists gathering evidence of war crimes.

[104][105] In May he wrote a briefing from the village of Tsyrkuny on how it had survived occupation by Russian soldiers,[106] and from Kharkiv about continuing efforts by local anti-corruption activists.

[113] 2024: In January he returned to the Kharkiv region, including the front line of war at Kupiansk, and authored another report with Maya Fernandez-Powell on the need for greater psychological support for civilians in Ukraine.

[121] 2025: In January he wrote a report on the October 2024 targeting and killing of Human Rights Defender Tigran Galustyan by a Russian military drone.

[128] In 2006 he was part of an Amnesty International team in Lebanon during the Israeli-Hezbollah war documenting Israeli air strikes and other attacks on civilian infrastructure.

[129] In November and December 2024 he was in Lebanon researching and writing a report for the Gulf Centre for Human Rights on attacks on journalists during the 2023/2024 war.

[130] In 2015 he reported from the UAE[131] on the suffocation of civil society there on the eve of UEA and other Gulf leaders arriving at Camp David for a summit meeting with President Obama.

[133][134] In July 2019 he wrote an opinion piece for the Washington Post on how the United Arab Emirates (UAE) was escaping scrutiny for its abysmal human rights record.