Collaboration in a ‘North–South’ Context: The Role of Power Relations and the Various Context-Based Conditions

Abstract

This response is focusing on the various power structures influencing research–practice–collaborations, transdisciplinary projects, and participation. It will be discussed how power asymmetries globally as well as locally influence and structure collaborations and participation between the involved actors and, thus, the expected transformative potential of the produced knowledge. Based on experiences and challenges encountered during a North–South capacity building project, it will be shown how funding schemes as well as the positionalities of the involved actors produce and reproduce historical, social, or cultural power structures which influence research–practice–collaborations. The main argument put forward is that instead of focusing in the current scientific as well as science-policy debates primarily on how research–practice–collaborations and/or participation could be improved ‘technically,’ the respective contexts and/or power structures and relations have to be considered and reflected in each phase of collaborative endeavors. This especially, but not exclusively, in the context of North–South collaborations.