German Institute for Global and Area Studies | Leibniz-Institut für Globale und Regionale Studien

German Institute for Global and Area Studies | Leibniz-Institut für Globale und Regionale Studien

DEEN

Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

Lead Research Fellow | Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

  • Short CV

    • Since 08/2023: Co-Director of the GIGA Institute of Latin American Studies (ad interim)
    • Since 08/2023: Presidency of CEISAL (Consejo Europeo de Investigaciones Sociales de América Latina)
    • Since 05/2015: Head of the GIGA Berlin Office

    • 2014: Appointed as Honorary Professor at Freie Universität Berlin

    • 11/2011 - 10/2014: Acting Director of the GIGA Institute of Latin American Studies

    • 2007/2008: Guest Lecturer at the Freie Universität Berlin, SFB 700 "Governance in Areas of Limited Statehood"

    • 2007: Visiting Scholar at Nuffield College, Oxford University

    • Since 2006: Deputy to the Director, Institute of Latin American Studies

    • Since 2003: Senior Researcher at the GIGA Institute of Latin American Studies

    • 2003: Doctorate (Dr. rer. pol., summa cum laude) at the Political Science department of the Freie Universität Berlin; Doctoral Thesis on "The Politics of the Internet in Third World Development"

    • 1998 - 2003: Lecturer at the Latin American Institute of the Freie Universität Berlin

    • 1998: Research Scholarship by the Instituto Rio Branco (Brasilia)

    • 1993 - 1998: Researcher at the Institute for Ibero-American Studies, Hamburg

    • Political Science studies at the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

    Current Research

    Countries and Regions

    • Latin America

    • Caribbean

    • Cuba

    Memberships

    • Heidelberg Center for Ibero-American Studies, Appointed member of the Board of Trustees ("Kuratorium"), 2024 - 2026
    • Heidelberg Center for Ibero-American Studies, Member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Heidelberg Center for Ibero-American Studies (HCIAS) of Heidelberg University, 2023 - 2026
    • Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies, The University of the West Indies, Honorary Research Fellow at The University of the West Indies, Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies (SALISES), Mona Campus (Jamaica)., 2023 - 2025
    • European Council for Social Research on Latin America, Presidency of CEISAL - Consejo Europeo de Investigaciones Sociales de América Latina, 2022 - 2025

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    [email protected]

    Publications

    Contribution | 08/2024

    The Social Determinants of Maternal and Congenital Syphilis at the Colombia-Venezuela Border: A Qualitative Study of Twenty Mothers of Newborns with Congenital Syphilis

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    Prof. Dr. Merike Blofield

    Associate

    Internationale Politik | 03/2023

    Prekärer Alltag in Kuba

    High out-migration, food shortages and precarious everyday-life mark socialist Cuba as the country is heading for the National Assembly elections on 26 March 2023. While the single-party system secures government candidates' victory, abstentions and blank votes may reach a new high.

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte | 09/2022

    Erschöpfte Revolution: Kuba 60 Jahre nach der Raketenkrise

    60 years after the Cuban missile crisis brought the world to the brink of nuclear war, the Caribbean island remains under Communist Party rule, but is plagued by a severe economic and social crisis.

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    Foro Europa~Cuba Policy Brief | 06/2022

    Institutional Reform and Social Policies in Post-Covid Cuba: An Agenda for Cooperation

    Cuba and the European signed a Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement (PDCA) in December 2016. In the light of the changes in the domestic and international environment since then, the paper assesses current policy options.

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    Chapter in Edited Volume | 04/2022

    Cuba in the Post-Castro Era. A New Political Culture in the Making?

    More than six decades after the Cuban Revolution, both Fidel and Raúl Castro no longer hold the reins of power. Despite the continuity of Communist Party rule, in the post-Castro era the island’s political culture is in flux – through changes from above as well as through changes from below.

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    Research Projects

    Research Project | 17/10/2022 - 31/12/2023

    Interventions on COVID-19 Vaccination and other infectious Diseases in the Migrant Population at the Colombian-Venezuelan Border

    Among Venezuelan migrants in Colombia, highly treatable diseases such as syphilis have become a major health concern, with particularly serious risks for pregnant women and infants. Medical treatment faces the challenges of how to reach out to the migrants in often precarious legal and material situations. The project will explore effective ways to provide adequate prevention and health care measures for the at-risk population in the context of these obstacles.
    GIZ, 2022-2023

    Research Project | 01/05/2021 - 31/12/2025

    German-Latin American Centre of Infection & Epidemiology Research and Training (GLACIER)

    The COVID-19 pandemic is showing that infectious diseases can only be solved by global efforts; and that medical and social approaches must go hand in hand in order to provide solutions. Based on this understanding, the GIGA has become part of the new multi-disciplinary „German-Latin American Centre of Infection & Epidemiology Research and Training“ – GLACIER and will work on a comparative study of vaccination policies in Central America, Mexico and the Caribbean. DAAD, funded by the German Federal Foreign Office, 2021-2025

    Research Project | 01/01/2018 - 30/11/2022

    Europe-Cuba Forum Network

    The EU and Cuba signed a Political Dialogue and Cooperation Agreement (PDCA) in 2016 to open a new stage of constructive engagement. The Europe-Cuba Forum is a Jean Monnet network project shich brings together leading scholars from Europe and Cuba to analyse the prospects, possibilities and limitations for such cooperation, highlighting the economic reform agenda, social policies and governance questions.
    EC, Erasmus+, 2018-2022

    Research Project | 01/01/2016 - 31/08/2021

    The Return of Race-based Inequalities in Contemporary Cuba: Analysing the Impact of Past Migration and Current Reforms

    Few political transformations have attacked social inequalities more thoroughly than the 1959 Cuban Revolution. The research project addresses to what extent and through what mechanisms structural inequalities have been returning in recent years which echo Cuba’s pre-revolutionary socio-ethnic hierarchies. To this end, a unique nationwide survey with more than one thousand respondents is carried out. As access to hard currency becomes key, racialized migration patterns of the past make for highly unequal access to family remittances, and also the gradual opening of private business disfavors Afro-Cubans.
    DFG, 2016-2021

    Media Contributions

    Die ZEIT | Interview | 24/10/2024

    »Hier gehen jetzt die Lichter aus«

    GIGA-Experte Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann im Interview mit der ZEIT zu Kubas Krise und Perspektiven nach dem dreitägigen Kollaps des Energienetzes auf der gesamten Insel.

    Der Tagesspiegel | Quote | 28/12/2023

    Gefangen im Hochsicherheitsknast auf Kuba: Der Kampf einer Dresdner Familie um die Freilassung von Luis Frómeta Compte

    Zu 15 Jahren Haft hat Havannas Justiz den Deutsch-Kubaner 2021 verurteilt – für das Filmen von Protesten. Doch im Gefängnis ist er in Lebensgefahr. Warum bekommt die Bundesregierung ihn nicht frei?

    Travelbook | Quote | 27/04/2022

    Kennen Sie den Unterschied zwischen Südamerika und Lateinamerika?

    Short article explaining the difference between the terms "South America" and "Latin America"

    Lectures

    Conference | 27/11/2023 - 29/11/2023

    How Asymmetric Immunity Wrote Caribbean History - and Why We Know so Little about It

    GLACIER Project Annual Conference, University of Havana Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann (Speaker)

    Keynote lecture in the Aula Magna of the University of Havana at the opening of the GLACIER project's annual conference

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    GIGA Talk | 06/11/2023

    “China: Partner, Rival, System Competitor” – Expectations on the Implementation of the German Government’s China Strategy

    “China: Partner, Rival, System Competitor” – Expectations on the Implementation of the German Government’s China Strategy, Online-Veranstaltung Organisers: German Institute for Global and Area Studies (GIGA) Prof. Dr. Patrick Köllner (Moderator, Chair), Wolfgang Rudischhauser (Organiser), Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann (Organiser)

    Die China-Strategie der Bundesregierung lässt Spielraum für die Ausgestaltung der Politik gegenüber einem immer selbstbewussteren China. Bei diesem GIGA Talk diskutieren mit Ihnen Vertreter:innen aus Politik und Wirtschaft, sowie Expert:innen aus Wissenschaft und Politik über das Verhältnis Deutschlands zu China.

    Prof. Dr. Patrick Köllner

    Wolfgang Rudischhauser

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Conference | 04/09/2023 - 05/09/2023

    Back to the Cold War? Russia, China and the Implications for Latin America

    Winds of Change and Streams of Solidarity, University of Bergen Organisers: University of Bergen Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann (Speaker)

    Prof. Dr. Bert Hoffmann

    Lead Research Fellow / Co-Leader of the GIGA Institute for Latin American Studies (ad interim) Head GIGA Berlin Office Editor GIGA Focus Latin America

    Teaching

    Teaching | Freie Universität Berlin | 2021

    Lateinamerika als Labor der Moderne

    Freie Universität Berlin Berlin Germany

    with Barbara Fritz and Renata Motta

    Teaching | Freie Universität Berlin | 2016

    Transatlantic Caribbean: Political, Social and Cultural Interconnections

    Freie Universität Berlin Berlin Germany

    Teaching | Freie Universität Berlin | 2014

    Old and new inequalities in Cuba

    Freie Universität Berlin Berlin Germany

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