Freedom House Experts Join Executive Leadership Team

Freedom House is happy to announce Gerardo Berthin as vice president for international programs and Adrian Shahbaz as vice president for research and analysis.

“Gerardo and Adrian have already made enormous contributions to the work of Freedom House, and I am thrilled they are joining our executive team,” said Freedom House president Michael J. Abramowitz. “Their bold, innovative approaches to democracy support and many years of experience advocating for human rights and good governance are invaluable to our mission of creating a world where all people are free, especially during this challenging time for democracy across the globe.”

Berthin was previously the director of Latin America and Caribbean programs at Freedom House. He has more than 20 years of experience working on democratic governance, anticorruption, human rights, and civil society strengthening in the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, Asia, and Central and Eastern Europe. Prior to joining Freedom House, Berthin was a senior associate at Tetra Tech’s Democracy and Governance sector, and 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 is the author of two books on political development and democracy, and the coauthor of three books about democratic governance, political parties, and institutional development, respectively. He holds master’s degrees from Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and a certificate in managing political and economic reform from the Harvard Kennedy School.

Shahbaz previously served as Freedom House’s director of technology and democracy and a lead author of the annual Freedom on the Net report. He spearheaded the creation and expansion of a multidimensional program dedicated to monitoring the global state of human rights online, analyzing digital threats to election integrity, and advocating for a free and open internet. Prior to joining Freedom House, he worked as a researcher at the UN Department of Political Affairs, the European Parliament, and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). He holds a master’s degree from the London School of Economics.