Aspen is a place for leaders to lift their sights above the possessions which possess them. To confront their own nature as human beings, to regain control over their own humanity by becoming more self-aware, more self-correcting, and hence more self-fulfilling.

Walter P. Paepcke, Aspen Institute Co-Founder
Roger Santodomingo black and white headshot by Platon (2026)

Roger Santodomingo

Senior Fellow

Roger Santodomingo is a communication strategists, editorial leader, and author who, over more than 20 years across Latin America, the UK and the US, has turned complex ideas—economic, political, technological, and environmental—into stories that move audiences and decisions.

He is a 2026 Aspen McKinsey Executive Leadership Fellow. He conducts research on AI governance and its intersection with the humanities. As Head of Global Communications for the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE), he built global communications into a strategic editorial function and led storytelling on entrepreneurship and international development, green growth and climate at Aspen Ideas Climate, Climate Week NYC, and COP. He currently works in Societal Trust and Economic Opportunities, leading one of Aspen’s international initiatives.

Earlier, he was editorial partner to Moisés Naím on the Emmy-winning program Efecto Naím, and reported for the BBC World Service and Telemundo. His commitment to press freedom and human rights was forged growing up in Venezuela, where he became a nationally recognized civic society leader. He co-founded the Caracas daily TalCual with the statesman and intellectual Teodoro Petkoff — work recognized with Venezuela’s Simón Bolívar National Prize for Journalism.

He has written several nonfiction books and runs CICERO, a bilingual current affairs Substack on classical thought, technology, and the information order. He holds an MSc in Social Communications and an MSc in Comparative Politics from the London School of Economics, where he was a Chevening Scholar.

Authored by Roger:

FIG. 1 SYNTAX-MATTER APPARATUS (GOLEM) illustration shows a stone golem with a "void area (absence of subjectivity)" labeled on its left arm. Input A is labeled as "THE 'WORD' COMMAND SIGNAL" and Output B is labeled as "LITERAL SYNTAX (NO SEMANTIC UNDERSTANDING)". The golem holds a stack of books in its right hand.
Publications

Who Keeps the Golem?

The Aspen Institute has released a new white paper about AI, authorship, and what is at stake for the future of books.

AI surrealist painting by Kelly Boesh featuring a profile portrait with a large orange halo-like shape above its head, emanating pink stripes from its mouth. The face is composed of various textured circles and organic shapes in muted colors, with bright red lips. The background features a yellow sky and a dark teal landscape with two stylized trees.
Blog Posts

The Artist Is Still in the Room

The case for practical optimism. A dispatch from Shared Futures: the AI Forum, at the Times Center.

A fantastical tower resembling the Tower of Babel incorporates a large clock face and exposed gears, with a coastal city and ships in the background. An Image of Pope Leo appears faded, left over the clouds. Signing Magnifica Humanitas encyclical.
Blog Posts

The Pope and the Clock

“Magnifica Humanitas” has been read as a moral rebuke of Silicon Valley. In truth, it is an argument about speed and that is why no one there is listening.

A Guatemalan farmer in a plaid shirt uses a smartphone in a field of yellowish crops. Technology in the field requires a human anchor. Source: Gabrijelagal / Getty Images
Blog Posts Longform

What AI Can’t Reach at the End of the Road

A group of leading practitioners in development and entrepreneurship learned a difficult lesson. Cheap intelligence does not close the gaps that aid is supposed to fix. In fact, if nothing is done, it can make those gaps even wider.

We almost named the conference something safer
Blog Posts

We almost named the conference something safer

What a 47-page communications playbook is actually for, and the day it told us to stop being careful