Advancing Digital Sovereignty in Latin America: challenges and lessons for Europe
What can the EU and the UK learn from Latin America in its fight for expanding digital sovereignty?
Advancing Digital Sovereignty in Latin America: challenges and lessons for Europe
08 Jul 2025, 17:30 – 19:00
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About this talk:
What can the EU and the UK learn from Latin America in its fight for expanding digital sovereignty? What is the space for sharing and replicating initiatives and for developing a common strategy among non-aligned countries for offering alternatives and effectively tame the power of US and Chinese Big Tech?
In this online roundtable we will contribute to this debate by listening to two inspiring cases:
- ANTEL is Uruguay’s main telecommunication company. It is state-owned and was responsible for developing the digital infrastructure that now assures that 94% of the Uruguayan households have internet access. ANTEL also provides fibre optics internet to 99% of all those households.
- The Chilean government has developed a digital tool that maps 71 socio-environmental indicators and regulations for every square kilometre in one of its regions, with plans to expand the initiative nationwide. The mapping tool will be used to assess suitable locations for installing datacentres, ensuring that they are not placed in socio-environmentally sensitive areas. The government is open to sharing the tool with other governments, and it can be adapted to map other regulations and indicators to support territorial planning and relocation of other industries.
Building an alternative digital value chain is possible but it requires common efforts and the identification of the key chokepoints in the hands of Big Tech that must be replaced. While the experiences that we will discuss in this debate are not enough by themselves to offer such an alternative, they can be seen as crucial and necessary pieces of an integrated, ecosystemic approach to expanding democratic digital sovereignty for people and the planet.
Meet the panel:
- Chair: Dr Cecilia Rikap, Head of Research and Associate Professor in Economics at the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP)
- Sebastián Díaz Howard-Allman, Advisor of Chile's Minister of Science
- Pablo Alvarez López, ANTEL's Vice President
Sebastián Díaz Howard-Allman is a Political Scientist from Universidad Diego Portales and holds an MSc in Sustainable Cities from the University of Leeds. He currently leads the development and implementation of Chile’s National Data Centers Plan, as well as the Ministry’s agenda on technology and economic growth.
Pablo Álvarez has assumed the position of Vice President of Antel. He holds a degree in Political Science from the Faculty of Social Sciences at the University of the Republic, where he is currently pursuing a Master’s in Political Science. In his legislative career, he served as a Representative for Montevideo during the 2005–2010 term and as an alternate Senator in the following term. He also held the positions of General Director of the Secretariat of the Ministry of Education and Culture.
Head of Research and Associate Professor in Economics at UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose
IIPP, UCLCecilia Rikap (PhD in economics from the Universidad de Buenos Aires) is associate professor in Economics and Head of Research at IIPP- UCL. Until joining UCL, she was a permanent Senior Lecturer in International Political Economy (IPE) at City, University of London and programme director of the BSc in IPE at the same university. She is a tenure researcher of the CONICET, Argentina’s national research council, and associate researcher at COSTECH lab, Université de Technologie de Compiègne.
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