Systemic failures in north–south climate change knowledge transfer: a case study of the Congo Basin

Abstract

ABSTRACT Climate change cooperation projects in the Congo Basin are often rooted in a paradigm based on scientific knowledge transfer between north and south. Their outputs, however, have often been criticized by both policymakers and scientists in Central African countries who claim that the projects are not contributing to the development of the Congo Basin. This study used the Research-Integration-Utilization framework to identify and document how the combination of power imbalances and misalignment of actors’ incentives undermined the capacity building potential of a large, multi-year north–south knowledge transfer project. Using data from documents, interviews and participant observation, we found that, under the umbrella of a development project, experts from developed countries pushed the specific aims of research toward global modelling instead of focusing on local impacts on land use in the Congo Basin, which were the primary concerns of stakeholders in the area. Moreover, both the integration and utilization phases were undermined by the power imbalance and resulted in a product of little relevance or utility for Congo Basin countries. Key policy insights As currently conducted, north–south scientific climate change knowledge transfer is not substantially supporting either the development prospects or the capacity building needs of Congo Basin countries. The main cause of this problem lies in domination of the scientific climate change knowledge transfer process by power games, along with misalignment of actors’ incentives. Identifying the interests and agendas of all actors at the integration stage before the research stage would be a useful strategy for such projects moving forward.