How an idea became HIIG

In the early 2010s, digitalisation raised more and more questions that the German research landscape was not equipped to answer. The internet was, and still is, not a subject that belongs to any single discipline: the changes it brought ranged from business models to how societies conduct public debate and reach decisions, and they only made sense when several disciplines worked together. What the field lacked was space for that collaboration to happen.

To fill this gap, the Berlin Social Science Center (WZB), the Humboldt University of Berlin (HU), the Berlin University of the Arts (UdK) and the Hans Bredow Institute for Media Research in Hamburg (now the Leibniz-Institute for Media Research | Hans-Bredow-Institut) joined forces to take this on: interdisciplinary, independent and focused on the interplay between technology and society. A generous unrestricted gift from Google paved the way for what became the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society (HIIG). In October 2011, the founding partners came together for an opening symposium to shape the institute's agenda and direction. A few months later, they formally established HIIG as the first institute for internet and society in Germany.

From the outset, HIIG saw itself as a node in an international network of knowledge production. The Global Network of Internet and Society Research Centers (NoC) took shape alongside HIIG, which was among its initial partners and coordinated the network in its early years. Today, the network connects more than 140 institutions worldwide, including, since 2017, a European Hub initially coordinated by HIIG.

The years that followed brought turning points that shaped today's connected world, whether the Snowden revelations, Angela Merkel's "Neuland", the General Data Protection Regulation or the rise of generative AI. HIIG tracked these developments in digital society and examined the dynamic relationship between innovation and governance.

What began as a coalition of different disciplines grew, through wide-ranging research projects and many-voiced debates, into a genuinely interdisciplinary institute, in some projects even a transdisciplinary one. Along the way, researchers found a shared language, practised working across disciplines and, at times, took wrong turns together. This process of growing together is still not finished: HIIG continues to test and develop it. Its current research focus areas and projects reflect where that stands today.

After eleven years of institutional funding from Google, along with further successful fundraising and third-party-funded projects, HIIG has been on new footing since 2025: the Joachim Herz Foundation, Stiftung Mercator and the Foundation Science and Democracy now jointly provide its institutional funding. On this basis, the institute is further developing its research across four key focus areas.