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Institutional Learning in North–South Partnerships: Critical Self-Reflection on Collaboration Between Finnish and Tanzanian Academics
Abstract
Knowledge production and its possibilities and pitfalls in North–South research partnerships have gained increasing attention. The previous literature has identified certain pervasive challenges, and suggested a variety of ways to change partnerships, ranging from improvement of current collaboration activities to fundamental transformation of the hegemonic Eurocentric criteria for knowledge. Against this backdrop, we ask what kinds of learning can take place in research partnerships. We draw from two sources – an institutional approach and a classical categorization of learning proposed by Gregory Bateson – to develop a heuristic for analyzing institutional learning in North–South research partnerships. Moreover, based on previous empirical studies and our own experience with academic collaboration between Finnish and Tanzanian scholars, we reflect on the ways in which learning in its different forms shows in partnership practices that need to deal with different, intertwined institutional fields.
... Epistemic coloniality indicates that ways of knowing in many parts of the world are imprinted with the long-term consequences of massive processes of colonisation and decolonisation (Maldonado-Torres 2016). 2 Level 1 learning, or single-loop learning, involves the change of responses within an existing set of alternatives (Bateson 1972). In North-South partnerships, discussions may revolve around addressing the capacity deficit in the South without reflecting on taken-for-granted power relations (Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020b). Learning 2 involves "not only learning to do things better but also learning to do may lead to a profound redefinition of the self and which, in their opinion, could lead to "first, abandoning the notion of development; second, changing the Eurocentric epistemological principles of academic research; and third, changing the nature and role of the higher education institutions" (Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020b). ...
... In North-South partnerships, discussions may revolve around addressing the capacity deficit in the South without reflecting on taken-for-granted power relations (Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020b). Learning 2 involves "not only learning to do things better but also learning to do may lead to a profound redefinition of the self and which, in their opinion, could lead to "first, abandoning the notion of development; second, changing the Eurocentric epistemological principles of academic research; and third, changing the nature and role of the higher education institutions" (Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020b). ...
... It recognises that actors have different interests, values, and goals in the partnership. Conflicting agendas are recognised to occur within donor-recipient relationships that generate asymmetric power relationships (Ishengoma 2016;Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020b). Learning 3 involves a profound redefinition of the self. ...
This paper introduces an approach to transform academic North-South collaborations. Critiquing entrenched dynamics in inter-university collaborations, we propose a methodology for unlearning colonial modes of thinking and relating. The trans-formative dialogues proposed in this paper illustrate how researchers can jointly engage in generating collective reflexivity and mutual accountability to challenge established norms in academia. Using autoethnographic vignettes, we demonstrate how these dialogues bring to the fore our complicities in reproducing North-South imbalances as well as the difficulty of unsettling power dynamics and fostering collective coexistence across differences. By nurturing a safe space for tuning in with each other, transformative dialogues turn self-reflexivity into a relational and dia-logical process. They help (1) to reflect on our past and present experiences, (2) to perceive failure as a learning stimulus rather than deficiency or shame, (3) to confront us with our complicity in reproducing neocolonial power dynamics in academic collaborations, and (4) to transform interpersonal dynamics within academic collaborations.
... Further, in North-South cooperation, questions of cultural locatedness of knowledge are arguably present (e.g. Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020). Despite these tensions, the encouraging feedback we received when bringing back our findings to the participants in several research seminars indicates that the analysis did capture and voice some of the key concerns of Eritrean teacher educators. ...
... Research collaboration, especially when initiated from the South, can become a significant space for institutional learning and improvement and an opportunity to decolonise institutional partnerships (Asare et al. 2020;Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020). The partnerships with Finnish institutions have allowed exposure to Finnish education through joint seminars, workshops, research and visits to Eritrea and Finland. ...
... The partnerships with Finnish institutions have allowed exposure to Finnish education through joint seminars, workshops, research and visits to Eritrea and Finland. Our experiences of collaboration at the CoE re-emphasise the importance of sustained partnerships, purposeful induction and institutionalised research in creating a stimulating culture for collaborative professional development and mutual learning (see also Posti-Ahokas, Meriläinen, and Westman 2018;Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020). Identifying and developing successful approaches to professional development requires further research. ...
Strengthening the identities of teacher educators is critical to quality teacher education and implementing change in the education sector. This study examines the professional identities of Eritrean teacher educators and how these identities can be strengthened through collaborative professional practice in a challenging context currently under reform. The focus is on the professional capacity building activities at the College of Education in Eritrea, which were implemented in collaboration with Finnish education partners. The paper reports on findings from an action-research informed study of a semester-long series of professional development seminars and an interview study with individual teacher educators. The qualitative content analyses of seminar participants’ drawings, evaluations and interview data focus on: 1) identifying critical issues that support the formation of teacher educator identities, and 2) understanding how collaborative practice at the institutional level can support the strengthening of professional identities. The findings point to potential ways of creating critical colleagueship and more purposeful, contextually relevant approaches for professional development in teacher education. The need for strengthening the identities of teacher educators’ through bottom-up processes and in collaboration with international partners is highlighted.
... Research results from higher education and capacity-building partnerships have shown that partnerships are beneficial as they improve the quality of research, teaching, and learning [91,92]. However, others have found that North-South partnerships can be more successful when the needs and priorities of the Global South partners drive these partnerships [93]. ...
Urgent political action is required to arrest the rise in global temperature within the 1.5°C target of the Paris Agreement. Rising to this challenge, a series of Just Transition Energy Partnerships (JETPs) was launched between individual Global South and a group of Global North countries since COP 26 in Glasgow. Germany, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, and the European Union (International Partner Group or IPG countries) have established plurilateral partnerships with individual countries like South Africa, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Senegal in each JETP. These partnerships aim to help IPG countries provide long-term support to partner countries in the Global South to disengage from coal and convert to renewables for electricity generation. However, though ’just transitions’ and ’partnerships’ are potent ideas to drive such processes, it is challenging to translate these ideas from political rhetoric to policies. This paper argues that JETPs are treading on a narrow edge with a high chance of re-instantiating some of the criticism of partnerships between Global North and Global South countries that can detrimentally affect the chances of just transition. Based on academic literature on partnerships and just transition, the paper concludes that the devil lies in the details. Formalizing processes that deliver a just and fair energy transition should align with the Global South countries’ social, economic, and political realities.
... To address these questions, a vast theoretical literature has developed on how TRCs should be organized, how academics and practitioners should (inter)act in facilitating TRCs, and how TRC-based activities should be better facilitated. Conversely, there are few examples of TRC systems that detail how transboundary collaborations are organized, how academics and practitioners do interact, and how activities are facilitated (e.g., Fransman et al., 2021;Kontinen & Nguyahambi, 2020a, 2020bWhite, 2020). Put differently, "if we don't know what people do and what they think about their work, we will never be able to create a deeper understanding of the project, its rationale and future impact" (Dymitrow & Ingelhag, 2020). ...
Motivation
Transboundary research collaborations (TRCs) are critical in supporting evidence‐based actions to address complex global issues, yet there remains a lack of empirical knowledge that would detail how TRCs are organized, how activities are facilitated, and how actors interact.
Purpose
We address this knowledge gap by evaluating a North–South TRC against the 11 principles for TRCs defined by the Commission for Research Partnerships with Developing Countries (KFPE).
Methods and approach
Using personal accounts, content analysis, and semi‐structured interviews/surveys, our evaluation casts light on how the process of running a TRC in the 21st century is enacted from the perspective of the individual.
Findings
Our results and discussion provide the basis for a more probing and systematic case for and against contemporary TRCs, their underlying value structures and ways of working, as well as the dimensions that are lacking.
Policy implications
Evaluation of TRCs must include the experience of all the actors involved in the TRC and not only the outcomes they produce; transdisciplinarity cannot be viewed as the only way to solve general development issues, but must be carefully considered in order not to mask underlying issues of inequality and poor ethics; and the ring‐fencing of funding for a specific purpose or TRC does not negate the need to scrutinize the activities that are undertaken in the name of the TRC.
... Recently, postcolonial scholars in development studies have presented similar critique (Schöneberg 2019;Strongman 2014;Sylvester 1999;Ziai 2016). At a more practical level, a wealth of contributions have pointed to the manifestations of asymmetries in North-South research collaborations (Carbonnier and Kontinen 2015;Kontinen and Nguyahambi 2020;White, this volume). ...
One of the frequently mentioned manifestations of asymmetrical relationships in North–South research collaboration has been challenges in co-authoring joint international publications. We critically reflect on our attempt to counteract this tendency and analyse a process of producing an edited volume on practices of citizenship in East Africa, which reports selected findings of a four-year collaborative research project between Tanzanian, Ugandan and Finnish academics. The project was based on philosophical pragmatism, and especially John Dewey’s ideas concerning learning as reformulation of habits. Consequently, our reflection of learning presented in this paper draws from the pragmatist notions of habit and disruption. We analyse how some prevalent habits in support of asymmetrical knowledge production emerged and the ways in which we attempted to reformulate them in our own practices by initiating continuous dialogue within the team, introduction of writing retreats and offering short-term fellowships.
International research collaborations can base their research focus, questions and interpretations of the issue on Western assumptions of knowledge. This can delegitimise the potential contributions of some project partners and silence their interpretations of the issue. International projects can therefore be spaces of what Fricker calls ‘hermeneutical injustice’. This chapter uses Quijano’s work on coloniality to identify enduring patterns of power that inform and shape frames of reference, culture and knowledge production in the colonised regions of the world. It argues that research collaborations should be based upon the recognition, understanding, and exchange of knowledges and interpretations of concepts and realities in multiple directions and dimensions. They should be based upon the justice of equality between people in their capacity as knowers and knowledge creators. To exemplify these issues, the chapter describes and explains practices in an Erasmus Mundus project. It reflects on and analyses the approaches adopted in the project to promote epistemic justice.
This background paper introduces our plans for collaboration, learning and action within the Transforming Education for Sustainable Futures (TESF) research network. It sits alongside others addressing the conceptual foundations of TESF (Tikly et al. 2020), the role of education for sustainable livelihoods (McGrath 2020) and cities (Parnell & Bazaz, forthcoming), the development of values-based indicators for SDG 4.7 (Brockwell et al. forthcoming), co-production research methods (Sprague & Cameron, forthcoming), and other areas relevant to our work. At the time of publication (November 2020) the COVID-19 pandemic is leading many of us to experience increased vulnerability, precarity and uncertainty. In this shifting landscape, progress towards reorienting education systems for more socially and environmentally sustainable futures requires us to focus on processes of collaboration, learning and adaptation in order to capitalise on distributed capacities and emergent windows of opportunity. As we outline in this paper, mobilising capacities is key to these efforts. Transforming education for sustainable futures requires coalitions and collaborations which span traditional boundaries-academic, professional, geographical and generational. Sustainability is not something which can be discovered by scientists and disseminated through policy and practitioner networks, but something which we ourselves must create through processes of collective 'deliberation, questioning, negotiation, and experimentation' (Wals 2019, p.62). This requires opening spaces for examining entrenched unsustainable patterns, habits and routines which have become 'frozen', and engaging in collective action which includes experimenting, making and learning from errors, and celebrating progress towards more sustainable alternatives. The significance of mobilising capacities for achieving the network's aims emerged through the course of our activities.
Social accountability monitoring (SAM) is an approach widely employed by many civil society organizations to promote active participation of people in governance processes, especially in the context where government traditionally is dominant governance actor. This chapter scrutinizes certain attempts to promote change in current citizenship habits obtained through different forms of participation. It discusses how implementation of SAM initiatives encounters multiple context-based factors that affect the expected outcomes. The discussions draw illustrative experiences from local NGO working in Kondoa district to promote change of state-citizens relations in order to improve service delivery in the health sector. The chapter analyses the ways in which the implementation of SAM both promotes and hinders citizens’ active participation focusing on the balance between ideal model and reality during its implementation in Tanzania.
Scientific collaboration between Northern and Southern researchers and development programs for research capacity-building have received new attention of practitioners and scholars during the last decades. This essay review takes four recent publications on North-South research cooperation and development politics as a starting point to ask for possible links between macro-, meso-, and micro-levels of social analysis that has found renewed interest in the sociology of science literature. The approach has the advantage to heuristically systematize the anthropological, sociological and policy-driven approaches chosen by the editors and authors of the books under review. Moreover, the focus on links between the three levels adds to the conceptual interaction of sociology of science and the science policy fields to estimate the effects of science governance in international and especially in asymmetrical relations with different access to resources.
With the adoption of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Paris Agreement, the purpose of development is being redefined in both social and environmental terms. Despite pushback from conservative forces, change is accelerating in many sectors. To drive this transformation in ways that bring about social, environmental and economic justice at a local, national, regional and global levels, new knowledge and strong cross-regional networks capable of foregrounding different realities, needs and agendas will be essential. In fact, the power of knowledge matters today in ways that humanity has probably never experienced before, placing an emphasis on the roles of research, academics and universities.
In this collection, an international diverse collection of scholars from the southern African and Nordic regions critically review the SDGs in relation to their own areas of expertise, while placing the process of knowledge production in the spotlight. In Part I, the contributors provide a sober assessment of the obstacles that neo-liberal hegemony presents to substantive transformation. In Part Two, lessons learned from North–South research collaborations and academic exchanges are assessed in terms of their potential to offer real alternatives. In Part III, a set of case studies supply clear and nuanced analyses of the scale of the challenges faced in ensuring that no one is left behind.
This accessible and absorbing collection will be of interest to anyone interested in North–South research networks and in the contemporary debates on the role of knowledge production.
The Southern African–Nordic Centre (SANORD) is a network of higher education institutions that stretches across Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Botswana, Namibia, Malawi, South Africa, Zambia and Zimbabwe. Universities in the southern African and Nordic regions that are not yet members are encouraged to join.
Background
At the turn of the 90s, studies showed that health research contributed little to health and development in low- and middle-income countries because it was oriented towards international priorities and dominated by researchers from the North. A new approach to North–South collaboration was required that would support demand-driven and locally led research in the South. The aim of this study was to analyse the development and functioning of a programme for demand-driven and locally led research in Ghana that was supported by a North–South collaboration. Methods
For this mixed-method case study, we combined document analysis, key informant interviews and observation of programme events. ResultsThe development of the research programme started with constructing a sponsorship constellation in the Netherlands. After highlighting the problems with traditional research collaboration, an advisory council formulated a vision for a more equal and effective approach to North–South collaboration. Together with Ghanaian partners, this vision was turned into a proposal for a Ghanaian-led programme for demand-driven and locally led research, which was funded by the Netherlands government. Research priority setting showed that the Ghanaian research needs were very different from the priorities of foreign funders and researchers. After a slow start, the number of locally submitted proposals increased from 13 in 2001 to 94 in 2005, revealing the existence of a substantial, but partly latent reservoir of research capacity. In total, 79 studies were funded. An impact evaluation showed that the results of the majority of the studies were used to contribute to action. Despite its success, the research programme came to an end in 2008 after the sponsorship constellation in the Netherlands fell apart. Conclusion
Our study shows that realising a programme for demand-driven and locally led research in the South provides an effective approach to North–South collaboration in which results are used and local capacities and institutions are strengthened.
Research partnerships are the foundation of successful engaged scholarship, which typically unites partners across disciplines, institutions, sectors, and countries. While rewarding and generative, these partnerships can also be challenging due to differences in expectations, power, and culture, and difficulties in trust and communication. This article reports on interviews with members of an international refugee research network about participating in global partnerships. Responses are interpreted in light of community university partnerships and South-North partnerships and suggest that both face many similar challenges arising out of structures and norms that privilege Northern, theory-based scholarship, institutions, and outcomes. Vigilance and awareness regarding context can help to confront these challenges. Moreover, global partnerships can benefit from strategies developed in the area of community university partnerships to facilitate trust, communication, and shared ownership of international research projects.
This article engages with the challenges facing genuine research collaboration and knowledge production in a North–South interaction. It maps the asymmetries in global knowledge production in general and revisits African realities in particular. Using the experiences of the Norwegian research programme NORGLOBAL as an empirical reference point, it critically explores the limitations of partnerships and identifies some challenges resulting from the centuries of Northern hegemony established in all spheres related to global affairs and interactions. It presents some thoughts and suggestions as to how these limitations might be reduced or eliminated in favour of a truly joint effort to meet the challenges on the way towards equal relations and mutual respect. Résumé Le présent article se penche sur les défis en matière de collaboration de recherche véritable et de production de connaissances, dans le cadre d'une interaction Nord-Sud. Il dresse les asymétries dans la production mondiale de connaissances en général et revisite les réalités africaines en particulier. En utilisant les expériences du programme de recherche norvégien NORGLOBAL comme point de référence empirique, il explore de manière critique les limites des partenariats et identifie quelques défis résultant des siècles d'hégémonie du Nord établie dans tous les domaines liés aux affaires et interactions à l'échelle mondiale. Il présente quelques réflexions et suggestions quant à la façon dont ces limites pourraient être réduites ou éliminées en faveur d'un véritable effort conjoint pour relever les défis et arriver à des relations d'égalité et de respect mutuel.
This article engages with the challenges facing genuine research collaboration and knowledge production in a North–South interaction. It maps the asymmetries in global knowledge production in general and revisits African realities in particular. Using the experiences of the Norwegian research programme NORGLOBAL as an empirical reference point, it critically explores the limitations of partnerships and identifies some challenges resulting from the centuries of Northern hegemony established in all spheres related to global affairs and interactions. It presents some thoughts and suggestions as to how these limitations might be reduced or eliminated in favour of a truly joint effort to meet the challenges on the way towards equal relations and mutual respect. Résumé Le présent article se penche sur les défis en matière de collaboration de recherche véritable et de production de connaissances, dans le cadre d'une interaction Nord-Sud. Il dresse les asymétries dans la production mondiale de connaissances en général et revisite les réalités africaines en particulier. En utilisant les expériences du programme de recherche norvégien NORGLOBAL comme point de référence empirique, il explore de manière critique les limites des partenariats et identifie quelques défis résultant des siècles d'hégémonie du Nord établie dans tous les domaines liés aux affaires et interactions à l'échelle mondiale. Il présente quelques réflexions et suggestions quant à la façon dont ces limites pourraient être réduites ou éliminées en faveur d'un véritable effort conjoint pour relever les défis et arriver à des relations d'égalité et de respect mutuel.
The manner in which people have been talking and writing about 'development' and the rules according to which they have done so have evolved over time. Development Discourse and Global History uses the archaeological and genealogical methods of Michel Foucault to trace the origins of development discourse back to late colonialism and notes the significant discontinuities that led to the establishment of a new discourse and its accompanying industry. This book goes on to describe the contestations, appropriations and transformations of the concept. It shows how some of the trends in development discourse since the crisis of the 1980s - the emphasis on participation and ownership, sustainable development and free markets - are incompatible with the original rules and thus lead to serious contradictions. The Eurocentric, authoritarian and depoliticizing elements in development discourse are uncovered, whilst still recognizing its progressive appropriations. The author concludes by analysing the old and new features of development discourse which can be found in the debate on Sustainable Development Goals and discussing the contribution of discourse analysis to development studies. This book is aimed at researchers and students in development studies, global history and discourse analysis as well as an interdisciplinary audience from international relations, political science, sociology, geography, anthropology, language and literary studies.
Hybrid organizations operate in a context of institutional plurality and enact elements of multiple, often conflicting institutional logics. Governance is highly relevant in navigating such an environment. This study examines how hybrid organizations set up their governance structures and practices. Building on survey data from 70 social enterprises, a subset of hybrid organizations, we identify two types of hybrid organization: conforming hybrids rely on the prioritization of a single institutional logic and dissenting hybrids use defiance, selective coupling and innovation as mechanisms to combine and balance the prescriptions of several institutional logics. We illustrate these mechanisms by drawing on the qualitative analysis of selected cases. This study refines current debates on social enterprises as hybrid organizations. Based on our findings, we speculate that some social enterprises might assume hybridity for symbolic reasons while others - genuine hybrids - do so for substantive reasons.
In the organizational learning literature a variety of concepts exists denoting some third order of organizational learning, notably that of ‘triple-loop’ learning. Despite this there has been no systematic, critical consideration of this concept or its origins, impeding both theoretical development and empirical research. Whilst ‘triple-loop learning’ has been inspired by Argyris and Schön, we establish that the term does not arise in their published work. Indeed, we argue that conceptualizations of triple-loop learning are diverse, often have little theoretical rooting, are sometimes driven by normative considerations, and lack support from empirical research. We map the major influences on these conceptualizations, including Bateson’s framework of levels of learning, and offer an original theoretical contribution that distinguishes between three conceptualizations of ‘triple-loop learning’. We also highlight implications for practice, and caution against the uncritical preference for ‘higher levels’ of learning that is sometimes discernible in the literature and in practice.
Research capacity building and its impact on policy and practice are increasingly highlighted in the literature on international research partnerships. In the field of education and development, it is recognised that, in the past, international research collaborations have tended to be dominated by the agenda of Northern partners. Partly in response, new modalities are developing and, in the UK, funding has recently been channelled through large consortia of research institutions spread across several countries delivering a themed programme of research projects. These are expected to build research capacity in the South and influence policy in the countries in which research is conducted, at the same time as producing quality research of international relevance. This article reflects critically on the experience of one research consortium made up of academic institutions in the UK and sub‐Saharan Africa. It analyses participation in setting the research agenda, distribution of leadership and forms of capacity building within the consortium. New roles and tensions are identified and implications are drawn out for future international collaborations, funding bodies and ongoing debate within the literature on international research partnerships.
Development management owes an unacknowledged debt to colonial administration, specifically to indirect rule. Development management, as opposed to development administration, has newly adopted a specific set of managerialist participatory methods, to achieve 'ownership' of development interventions. These methods are particularly evident in World Bank/ imf implementation of Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers ( prsp s) and Comprehensive Development Frameworks ( cdf s). They have their conceptual foundation in action research, invented, it can justly be argued, by John Collier, Commissioner of the US Bureau of Indian (ie Native American) Affairs 1933-1945. Collier was a self-proclaimed colonial administrator, and remained an advocate of indirect rule as late as 1963. Evidence is presented to show his development of action research was a tool of indirect rule. Achieving 'empowerment' through participation was at its very beginning, therefore, subject to the colonialist's asserted sovereign power; and the limited autonomy it granted was a means of maintaining that power.
In order to challenge the global knowledge divide, knowledge-producing systems in the South need to become more integrally linked to international research networks as full partners in knowledge accumulation and international exchanges. This paper raises some issues for discussion on
how North-South partnerships can contribute to supporting such processes. The paper draws evidence from the literature, existing Dutch programmes for North-South research cooperation, and recent innovative Dutch partnerships in North-South research, which emphasise a greater equitable exchange
with partners in the South. It shows that joint programmatic research builds up more cumulative patterns of capacity enhancement and international networks, although capacity retention remains a long-term problem in the South. New initiatives give more space to equal exchanges and learning
in the programmes than older established programmes. In the final section, five important issues that need to be explored in future studies of North-South research partnerships are discussed briefly.
‘The Global South’ has become a shorthand for the world of non-European, postcolonial peoples. Synonymous with uncertain development, unorthodox economies, failed states, and nations fraught with corruption, poverty, and strife, it is that half of the world about which the ‘Global North’ spins theories. Rarely is it seen as a source of theory and explanation for world historical events. Yet, as many nation-states of the Northern Hemisphere experience increasing fiscal meltdown, state privatization, corruption, and ethnic conflict, it seems as though they are evolving southward, so to speak, in both positive and problematic ways. Is this so? In what measure? What might this mean for the very dualism on which such global oppositions rest? Drawing on recent research, primarily in Africa, this paper touches on a range of familiar themes—law, labor, and the contours of contemporary capitalism—in order to ask how we might understand these things with theory developed from an ‘ex-centric’ vantage. This view renders some key problems of our time at once strange and familiar, giving an ironic twist to the evolutionary pathways long assumed by social scientists.
Development failures, environmental degradation and social fragmentation can no longer be regarded as side effects of ‘externalities’. They are the toxic consequences of pretensions that the modern Western view of knowledge is a universal neutral view, applicable to all people at all times. The very word ‘development’ and its cognates ‘underdevelopment’ and ‘developing’ confidently mark the ‘first’ world as the future of the ‘third’. This book argues that the linear evolutionary paradigm of development that comes out of the modern Western view of knowledge is a contemporary form of colonialism. The chapters — covering topics as diverse as the theory of knowledge underlying the work of John Maynard Keynes, what the renowned British geneticist J.B.S. Haldane was looking for when he migrated to India, the knowledge of Mexican and Indian peasants — propose a pluralistic vision and decolonization of knowledge: the replacement of one-way transfers of knowledge and technology by dialogue and mutual learning.
Governments' cuts in research and development funding for public universities in Tanzania has compelled these institutions to establish and develop extensive partnerships and links with universities, and research centers in the North. The establishment of the North-South partnerships has also coincided with the dominance of external and heavy dependence on external donors for funding of research and development activities in the majority of Tanzania public universities. This article, using the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), public university, seeks to shed light on whether or not partnerships make any significant contribution to the institution’s capacity building. The thesis of this paper is that although N-S partnerships are instrumental in institutional capacity building; they have not significantly contributed to the strengthening of higher education space at UDSM and apparently at other public universities in Tanzania because of inherent structural imbalances and inequalities embedded in the partnerships. .
We find ourselves at a social, political, economic and environmental crossroads, where Development Studies in all its facets have been designated a leading role. Postcolonial Studies and postcolonial perspectives have often been neglected in Development Studies debates. Usually the fields are considered as being far apart: the former being concerned with discourse and representation, the latter focusing on the applicability of concepts and practices. However, linking both fields of thought may provide valuable insights for Development Studies to better cope with the global challenges of the twenty-first century. To illustrate possible openings the chapter discusses analytical tools of Postcolonial Studies in the context of development. It asks whether Postcolonial-Development Studies are imaginable and how Development Studies and research can benefit from postcolonial strategies.
The chapter engages with challenges facing genuine research collaboration and knowledge production in a North–South interaction with particular reference to Development Studies. It maps asymmetries in scholarly interaction generally and examines African realities specifically. Partnership limitations are critically explored by identifying some structural legacies resulting from centuries of Northern hegemony established in all spheres related to global affairs and interactions. It presents some thoughts on how these limitations might be reduced or eliminated in favour of a truly joint effort to work towards equal relations and mutual respect—also as an integral part of EADI’s agenda for Development Studies to contribute towards global partnerships. Special attention is given to the variety of views from within the African continent and African scholars elsewhere engaged in related debates.
The chapter explores the ‘engaged excellence’ approach developed by the Institute of Development Studies. It combines high-quality, conceptually and empirically innovative research, with deep extensive engagement with local and global actors through our practices, partners and students. Four pillars contributing to engaged excellence high-quality research are identified: co-constructing knowledge; mobilising impact-orientated evidence, and building enduring partnerships, emphasising their mutual interdependence. The arguments supporting the concept of engaged excellence are epistemological, pragmatic, and normative. In each section, these arguments are outlined, acknowledging that an approach to research that embraces excellence and engagement means that trade-offs need to be made, and ethical and practical challenges navigated. It is shown that the approach has the potential to create more robust and influential research across Development Studies, and helps ensure its dual commitments to scholarly excellence and societal relevance.
The chapter discusses the history, dilemmas and future visions of Development Studies in Tanzania, especially from the perspective of Institute of Development Studies in the University of Dar es Salaam. It shows how in the 1970s Development Studies played a significant role in the consolidation of state ideology of African socialism among university students, and since then, has gradually evolved into a recognized discipline with MA and PhD programmes. Over the years, the discipline has dealt with dilemmas related to its multidisciplinary nature, state ideologies, international donor agendas and the changing demands concerning academic publications. Recently, Development Studies in Tanzania has started to address these dilemmas and search for a new identity, for example, through establishing a Tanzanian Development Studies Association.
https://www.routledge.com/Learning-and-Forgetting-in-Development-NGOs-Insights-from-Organisational/Kontinen/p/book/9781138089808
Making North–South Research Collaborations Work - Volume 51 Issue 3 - Jaimie Bleck, Chipo Dendere, Boukary Sangaré
This article explores two distinct strategies suggested by academics in Tanzania for publishing and disseminating their research amidst immense higher education expansion. It draws on Arjun Appadurai’s notions of ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ internationalisation to analyse the perceived binary between ‘international’ and ‘local’ academic journals and their concomitant differences in status. In an attempt to examine critically how the status quo regarding knowledge production in higher education is maintained and reproduced, the article explores interactions between a Tanzanian academic and an educational researcher from the global North, including the ways in which research collaborations between academics from different contexts and material conditions in their institutions may both advance and inhibit professional development of academics and comparative education research, writ large. The article concludes with a call for comparative education researchers to carefully consider the future of educational research in sub-Saharan Africa and the complexities of continued involvement in knowledge production processes.
Research for development is often undertaken through partnerships between researchers working in the Global North and Global South. Continued domination of collaborative agendas by the interests of Northern donors and scholars is often lamented, almost invariably eliciting calls for more equitable Southern engagement in agenda-setting processes. Yet the implications of this and the obstacles to its realization are rarely examined. This chapter examines how bilateral donor strategies affect collaborative agenda-setting processes: donor policies definitively shape these by requiring Southern researchers to partner with Northern counterparts in order to receive support. Innovative experiences of the Netherlands and the UK in the first decade of the 21st century demonstrate that revamping funding policies can improve Southern researchers’ ability to influence North–South research agendas, and diversify access to collaborative funding. But even the most innovative partnership funding strategies cannot resolve all tensions and inequalities inherent to collaborative agenda-setting processes.
Arguing for the idea of connected histories, Bhambra presents a fundamental reconstruction of the idea of modernity in contemporary sociology. She criticizes the abstraction of European modernity from its colonial context and the way non-Western 'others' are disregarded. It aims to establish a dialogue in which 'others' can speak and be heard.
How did the industrialized nations of North America and Europe come to be seen as the appropriate models for post-World War II societies in Asia, Africa, and Latin America? How did the postwar discourse on development actually create the so-called Third World? And what will happen when development ideology collapses? To answer these questions, Arturo Escobar shows how development policies became mechanisms of control that were just as pervasive and effective as their colonial counterparts. The development apparatus generated categories powerful enough to shape the thinking even of its occasional critics while poverty and hunger became widespread. "Development" was not even partially "deconstructed" until the 1980s, when new tools for analyzing the representation of social reality were applied to specific "Third World" cases. Here Escobar deploys these new techniques in a provocative analysis of development discourse and practice in general, concluding with a discussion of alternative visions for a postdevelopment era. Escobar emphasizes the role of economists in development discourse--his case study of Colombia demonstrates that the economization of food resulted in ambitious plans, and more hunger. To depict the production of knowledge and power in other development fields, the author shows how peasants, women, and nature became objects of knowledge and targets of power under the "gaze of experts." In a substantial new introduction, Escobar reviews debates on globalization and postdevelopment since the book's original publication in 1995 and argues that the concept of postdevelopment needs to be redefined to meet today's significantly new conditions. He then calls for the development of a field of "pluriversal studies," which he illustrates with examples from recent Latin American movements. © 1995 by Princeton University Press. 1995 by Princeton University Press.
This book uses a postcolonial lens to question development's dominant cultural representations and institutional practices, investigating the possibilities for a transformatory postcolonial politics. Ilan Kapoor examines recent development policy initiatives in such areas as 'governance,' 'human rights' and 'participation' to better understand and contest the production of knowledge in development - its cultural assumptions, power implications, and hegemonic politics. The volume shows how development practitioners and westernized elites/intellectuals are often complicit in this neo-colonial knowledge production. Noble gestures such as giving foreign aid or promoting participation and democracy frequently mask their institutional biases and economic and geopolitical interests, while silencing the subaltern (marginalized groups), on whose behalf they purportedly work. In response, the book argues for a radical ethical and political self-reflexivity that is vigilant to our reproduction of neo-colonialisms and amenable to public contestation of development priorities. It also underlines subaltern political strategies that can (and do) lead to greater democratic dialogue.
This article examines recent experiences in North-South research partnerships, at a time when the relevance of traditional dichotomies between “industrialized” and “developing” countries, or between “North” and “South”, is waning. Scientific collaborations between northern and southern researchers are at the crossroads of two organizational fields: academia and international development cooperation. This raises specific institutional learning challenges. The results of our study show that North-South research partnerships are not immune to the typically unequal, biased donor-recipient relations that have plagued international development cooperation for decades. Despite recent improvements, entrenched behaviour and enduring practices still affect the quality and effectiveness of research partnerships. Funding arrangements and ensuing power relations influence the ability to combine capacity-building aspirations with the drive for academic excellence. Mounting pressure to publish research outcomes fast in disciplinary journals edited in the North combined with harsh competition for funding seriously limit the time and space to establish equitable partnership frameworks and support institutional capacities. This calls for addressing funding, knowledge and power issues in development research partnerships, which involve a growing diversity of actors and modalities.
Recent work in social science challenges managerial assumptions about homogenous knowledge domains, and traces the effects of a world economy of knowledge structured by the history of colonialism and current north-south global inequalities. The differentiation of knowledge rests on the very different histories and situations of metropolitan, creole, colonized and post-colonial intelligentsias. Different knowledge projects have been constructed in global space, which feed back on our understanding of knowledge itself. Less recognized, but increasingly important, are uses of southern and postcolonial perspectives in applied social science, in areas ranging from education to urban planning. Some implications of these applications are discussed: southern theory is not a fixed set of propositions but a challenge to develop new knowledge projects and new ways of learning with globally expanded resources.
Networks and north–south partnerships have become prerequisites for much forced migration research funding. The objectives
vary but usually include levelling the scholarly playing field, improving research quality, building southern capacity and
relaying southern perspectives to northern policymakers. Reflecting on a decade’s work in Southern Africa, this article suggests
such initiatives often fall short of their objectives due to both mundane reasons and fundamentally unequal resource endowments
and incentive structures. Moreover, by pushing southern researchers towards policy-oriented research, filtering the voices
heard on the global stage, and retaining ultimate authority over funding and research priorities, these networks risk entrenching
the north–south dichotomies and imbalances they purport to address. While inequalities are rooted in an intransigent global
political economy of knowledge production, the article nonetheless concludes with a series of practical steps for improving
southern-generated research and future collaborations.
‘Postcolonial studies’ is the term given to the study of diaspora and the ideology of colonialism. Since the 1970s, when postcolonial studies was termed ‘Third World’ literature, and the 1980s, when it became ‘Commonwealth’ literature, the persistence of the framework of centre and margin, coloniser and colonised, has endured as a lens with which to view human identity and cultural expression. However, the relationship of postcolonial studies to international development is less well explored. Much of postcolonial studies is concerned with articulating patterns of gain, loss, inclusion, exclusion, identity formation and change, cultural evolution and human geographical dispersal in the wake of the after-effects of colonial rule. Postcolonial critics examine texts and images in order to make inferences about the significance of cultural identity and expression under these conditions. Often this is with a diachronic view of history. International development studies offers postcolonial critics a synchronic perspective on both the policy and materiality of political ideologies affecting cultural identity and expression. This paper looks at how the relationship between postcolonial and international development studies might be furthered in a dialectical exchange. Postcolonial critics such as Said and Pollard et al offer a critical understanding that informs policy making in international development contexts.
From Chapter 1: Empire and the creation of a social science Origin stories Open any introductory sociology textbook and you will probably find, in the first few pages, a discussion of founding fathers focused on Marx, Durkheim and Weber. The first chapter may also cite Comte, Spencer, Tönnies and Simmel, and perhaps a few others. In the view normally presented to students, these men created sociology in response to dramatic changes in European society: the Industrial Revolution, class conflict, secularisation, alienation and the modern state. This curriculum is backed by histories such as Alan Swingewood's (2000) Short History of Sociological Thought. This well-regarded British text presents a two-part narrative of 'Foundations: Classical Sociology' (centring on Durkheim, Weber and Marx), and 'Modern Sociology', tied together by the belief that 'Marx, Weber and Durkheim have remained at the core of modern sociology' (2000: x). Sociologists take this account of their origins seriously. Twenty years ago, a star-studded review of Social Theory Today began with a ringing declaration of 'the centrality of the classics' (Alexander 1987). In the new century, commentary on classical texts remains a significant genre of theoretical writing (Baehr 2002). The idea of classical theory embodies a canon, in the sense of literary theory: a privileged set of texts, whose interpretation and reinterpretation defines a field (Seidman 1994). This particular canon embeds an internalist doctrine of sociology's history as a social science. The story consists of a foundational moment arising from the internal transformation of European society; classic discipline-defining texts written by a small group of brilliant authors; and a direct line of descent from them to us. But sociologists in the classical period itself did not have this origin story. When Franklin Giddings (1896), the first professor of sociology at Columbia University, published The Principles of Sociology, he named as the founding father—Adam Smith. Victor Branford (1904), expounding 'the founders of sociology' to a meeting in London, named as the central figure—Condorcet.
Learning is a critical component of organisational effectiveness, particularly in the complex world of development NGOs. Drawing from the literature on organisational learning, this article highlights the key dynamics of a strong learning organisation and proposes an integrated 'leverage-learning' model adapted to the NGO context. This model integrates learning domains that are critical for greater effectiveness, or leverage. The model is then applied to evaluate the effectiveness of the learning culture and commitment of a specific development NGO, World Vision Burundi. The model shows promise as an heuristic tool to evaluate NGOs and help them become more effective in aid delivery.
This article explores and appraises Gregory Bateson's theory of “levels of learning” and its implications for Human Resource Development, with reference to issues of organizational learning. In Part One, after briefly reviewing Bateson's biography, the origins and contents of the theory are described. In Part Two, three particular features of the theory are explored, together with their implications for Human Resource Development: (i) The significance of the recursive relationship between the levels; (ii) It not being a stage theory of learning; “higher” levels of learning are neither superior to, nor necessarily more desirable than, lower levels; and (iii) Its emphasis on the notion of context. In Part Three, the discussion emphasizes the holistic nature of Bateson's theory, in that the levels of learning combine cognitive, embodied, and aesthetic dimensions. Some limitations of the theory are reviewed and then concluded by considering its perspective on the question, “do organizations learn?”
Introduction The motivation for this Handbook arose from a conversation with Don Palmer, who raised the question of whether organization theories in general have life cycles. Given the proliferation of theoretical paradigms, do organization theories build into coherent conceptual frameworks supported by diligently conducted empirical work, or do they fragment into proliferated confusion? That conversation never proceeded to a comparative assessment of organization theories. But it did lead to the present volume. It seemed, in late 2004, when the idea of a Handbook was mooted, an appropriate moment to take stock of the institutional perspective on organizations because we were approaching the thirtieth anniversary of seminal papers that not only triggered revitalization of interest in the role of institutions but became known as the new institutionalism. It is important at the outset to set down certain scope conditions for this volume: 1. Our interest is in understanding organizations. How 2. ...
This article presents and juxtaposes critical genealogies of development studies and postcolonial studies, two bodies of literature on the 'Third World' that ignore each other's missions and writings. I demonstrate that the two fields have some areas of convergence, such as groundings in knowledge of and concern about the West, and other areas of divergence: development studies does not tend to listen to subalterns and postcolonial studies does not tend to concern itself with whether the subaltern is eating. I argue that, of the two fields, postcolonial studies has the greatest potential to be a new and different location of human development thinking if it can overcome a tendency to lock into intellectual rather than practical projects of postcolonialism.