Abstract
The research on cross-national research cooperation, including the categories of Global South/North, tends to leave out the issue of research funding. However, research funders are no neutral infrastructure by and for the scientific community, but represent societal, political, or economic stakeholders, whose expectations shape funding policy goals and practices. In consequence, funders need to be integrated as intermediary organization when discussing the ideology and effects of geographic pairing. In our article, we develop and sustain the proposition that an analysis of funders’ views is imperative to understand the ways international research collaborations of unequally equipped participants are perceived, maintained, and sometimes reframed over time. Building on interview data and policy documents from six countries, we analyze the semantics employed to make sense of North–South relationships. We find that narratives from development cooperation complement and sometimes supersede the traditionally liberal meta-narrative of scientific collaborations.
Highlights
The Slowly Shifting Geography of ScienceThe end of the East–West conflict was a historic turning point in the political organization of the world
We argued that research funding plays an important role in shaping scientific collaborations between the North and the South, which is why we need to learn more about the discursive structures that influence funders’ perspectives
The semantic structure of our European and Japanese data follows the logics of deficits and limited exceptions from which the South African viewpoint considerably differs
Summary
The Slowly Shifting Geography of ScienceThe end of the East–West conflict was a historic turning point in the political organization of the world. Science is more slow-moving than some observers had expected and hoped It is a well-known fact that access to higher education (HE) worldwide is improving and enrollment rates have increased almost everywhere (Schofer & Meyer, 2005), yet there is no exponential development in the global production of scientific knowledge. Both aspects—HE and research—are strongly intertwined, yet in our article we primarily investigate the latter. Observers are skeptical that the overall increase in scientific collaboration has led to a spatial redistribution of scientific capacities and opportunities: “the global geography of science has not changed substantially” The vertical center-periphery structure in science persists and continues to reflect the global economic structure (Olechnicka et al, 2019, pp. 102–105)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
