Gerardo Berthin

Gerardo Berthin is president of Freedom House. He previously served as vice president of international programs at Freedom House.

Berthin has nearly three decades of experience working on democratic governance, anticorruption, human rights, and civil society strengthening. He has worked in over 50 countries in the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, and Central and Eastern Europe. Previously, he was director of the Latin America and Caribbean programs at Freedom House. Prior to joining Freedom House, he was a senior associate at Tetra Tech’s Democracy and Governance sector, where he managed large USAID-funded projects. From 2009 to 2014, he was the governance and decentralization policy advisor at the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Regional Service Center for Latin America and the Caribbean in Panama. He has done consultancies for the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation, and the Swedish Agency for Development Cooperation, among others.

Berthin is the author of two books on political development and democracy, chapters in various books on democratic governance, and over 50 articles in specialized peer-reviewed social science journals. He has co-authored three books about democratic governance, political parties, and institutional development, respectively. He is also the author or co-author of more than 12 UNDP national human development reports.

Berthin holds a master’s degree in political science from the University of Chicago, another master’s degree from Georgetown University in Latin American studies, and a bachelor’s degree in international affairs from George Washington University. He is a certified trainer from the UN Staff College in Turin, Italy, and has a certificate from Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government on leadership in development to manage political and economic reform.