Policy analysis – enabling equitable international research collaborations

The Academy has been facilitating international programmes for many years and is strongly committed to equitable partnerships. Since 2015, the Academy’s funding portfolio has also included schemes distributing Official Development Assistance (ODA) funding with a particular focus on institutions in the Global South, as well as prior work in collaboration with UK and African partners on the challenges of undertaking research in the humanities and social sciences in Africa. This led to three reports on African researcher support, support for African early career researchers, and frameworks for Africa-UK research collaboration.

The British Academy recognises the significant efforts and amount of work done in the past decade – first, in enabling more international collaborations and, second, in working towards more equitability in such partnerships. Notwithstanding these efforts, the Academy is aware that disparities remain.

The Academy is now looking to build on this activity to further consolidate and develop its support for equitable partnerships in the research it supports.

To understand and provide evidence of how existing terms and conditions, as well as policies within UK funders and universities, enhance or inhibit productive and equitable international research collaborations in the ODA context. The findings of this research will lead to recommendations and model policies which could be easily adopted by funders and UK universities to enable equitable international research collaborations within the ODA context but may have wider benefit.

• To review a selection of existing UK university HR, Finance, Governance, Library, and Research Management policies from at least five universities who are active in international research and determine to what extent their policies enable or inhibit equitable international research collaboration
• To review a selection of UK funder policies, which will be agreed prior to contract signing, and identify terms and conditions that both enable and inhibit equitable international research collaboration
• To review recent initiatives such as the Africa Charter for transformative research collaborations, Cape Town Statement, Four approaches to Supporting Equitable Partnerships, and the Southern Voices report on Envisioning an equitable future for research across the North-South Divide and determine to what extent the funders and the UK universities selected are currently complying with these recommendations

Deliverables

• A brief methodology proposal that defines the approach, parameters and scope within two weeks of contracting (max six pages)
• An interim report outlining key findings against the tasks outlined in section 4.0 (Tasks, maximum 20 pages) by 20 January 2025
• A draft final report by 10 March 2025 that addresses the questions outlined in section 4.0 (Tasks, maximum 40 pages excluding annexes) plus an executive summary (maximum two pages) which:
  • provides an overview of how UK funders’ and universities’ terms and conditions as well as policies enable or inhibit international research collaboration.
  • provides a gap analysis between policy approaches recommended in recent equitable partnership initiatives (listed in section 4.0) and the current state of UK Institutions’ terms and conditions/policies.
  • Having identified the gaps where the existing funders’ terms and conditions and university policies are not enabling or are inadvertently hindering equitable international collaborations, provide recommendations for how terms and conditions and policies of UK institutions could be adapted to enable equitable partnerships. This could also be achieved by developing model policies.
• An agreed final report by 31 March 2025
• A presentation of the findings to stakeholders at the Academy, March 2025

Those wishing to offer services should submit a CV and covering letter (maximum 5 pages) detailing relevant experience related to this Invitation to Tender, the ability to deliver the assessments within the required timeframe, and pricing for the provision of services. Please also include a gender equality statement and ODA compliance statement (maximum one page). The criteria against which tenders will be assessed are shown in Table 1.

The Academy shall award the Services to the Tenderer who offers the best value for money and quality of services. Tenders should be submitted as a single Word document or PDF by email to [email protected] by 12:00 BST, 14 October 2024.

The budget available for this assessment is up to £50,000, inclusive of VAT.

The Academy advises potential suppliers that the British Academy is a registered UK charity and the funds for this agreement are provided as part of the International Science Partnerships Fund (ISPF), which is designed to enable potential and foster prosperity. It puts research and innovation at the heart of the UK’s international relationships, supporting UK researchers and innovators to work with peers around the world on the major themes of our time. It is managed by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) and delivered by a consortium of the UK’s leading research and innovation bodies. In the context of this Tender, funding from the International Science Partnerships Fund is funded by ODA therefore, applications for this funding must be ODA-eligible. We therefore ask that you are mindful of restrictions we have and the obligation to acquit on all expenditure.

For further information, or to submit Tender clarifying questions, please contact Alex Lewis, Director of Research on [email protected].