Bert Hoffmann is Acting Director of the GIGA Institute of Latin American Studies, part of the Hamburg-based German Institute of Global and Area Studies. He received his doctorate from the Freie Universität Berlin with a thesis on “The Politics of the Internet in Third World Development” (published by Routledge in 2004). He has since published numerous articles on the public sphere in the digital age, the politics of telecom liberalization, and the impact of online activism on state-society relations in Latin America.

His most recent publication is: Civil Society in the Digital Age: How the Internet Changes State–Society Relations in Authoritarian Regimes. The case of Cuba. Forthcoming in: Cavatorta, Francisco (ed.): Civil Society Activism under Authoritarian Rule: A Comparative Perspective (Routledge/ECPR Studies in European Political Science), September 2012.

For more info see the website: http://staff.en.giga-hamburg.de/hoffmann

Session: Session 3 – Latin America: Online Creativity versus Offline Monopolies