Some 120 persons participated in this webinar.
AAS posted 27/06 the webinar recording on the AAS YouTube channel.
The study aimed to provide insights for future research support programmes by the AAS, taking into account the significant impact of Social Sciences, Humanities, Arts (SSHA) scholarship on sustainable development in Africa.
The study's outcomes were published in a journal article: Obed M. Ogega et all (2023) Research capacity strengthening in Africa: Perspectives from the social sciences, humanities, and arts
This article highlighted key findings and recommendations. The report published in 2022 by the African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA) – a network of 16 selected flagship research universities in Africa – showed that Social Sciences, Humanities, Arts (SSHA) research fields were more popular than other fields of research, in terms of postgraduate student enrolment. Yet, SSHA fields remain significantly underfunded in sub-Saharan Africa.
"More investment is required to advocate for, and enhance, research support for SSHA fields and, ultimately, optimize the contribution of SSHA researchers to sustainable development in Africa."
"More investment is also required to enhance the capacity of editorial teams, increase visibility of the journals, and facilitate access to the publications."
"Availability and access to research funding play a pivotal role in catalysing and enabling research. Unfortunately, many researchers in Africa have limited-to-no access to funding to support their research activities. The unavailability of adequate funding has resulted in limited resources and infrastructure to drive research excellence; inadequate research support systems; and hardly any protected time for research."
"One of the key issues highlighted from the study's stakeholder engagement activities was a lack of a well-coordinated pan-Africa program or initiative dedicated to supporting researchers in the SSHA fields in Africa."
"Amongst the aspects of SSHA research work that needs coordination is the agenda and priority setting in alignment with local, regional, and global development needs and priorities."
"An establishment of a series of conferences focusing on topical issues of regional and global interest will provide an opportunity for researchers in the SSHA to disseminate their work. Importantly, the involvement of postgraduate students should be a prerequisite for all supported activities to ensure skills transfer and enhanced impact."The webinar focused on:
- Lessons learned, opportunities, needs, and priorities for supporting Social Sciences, Humanities, Arts (SSHA) research in Africa.
- Increased awareness of the current state of play in terms of the research support provided to researchers in the SSHA and related fields in Africa
- Ideas for a comprehensive SSHA research support programme at the AAS informed by feedback obtained from the webinar.
- Moderator - Dr. Peggy Oti-boateng (see picture) Director Division of Science Policy and Capacity Building - UNESCO HQ
- Prof. Olumuyiwa Adegun, Federal University of Technology Akure, Nigeria
- Dr. Obed Ogega (see picture), Lead Author, The African Academy of Sciences, Kenya
- Ms Angela Melo, (see picture), Director, Division for Research, Ethics, and Inclusion, Sector of Social and Human Sciences, UNESCO, Paris, France
- Cheryl Hendricks (see picture), Executive Director, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, Cape Town, South Africa
- Peter Atekyereza, (see picture) Head of Department, Department of Sociology and Social Anthropology, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda
- Maria Mbatudde, (see picture) Kyambogo University, Faculty of Science, Uganda
- Charles Muyanja, (see picture) Department of Food Technology and Nutrition, Makerere University, Kampala, Uganda
- Razak Gyasi, African Population and Health Research Center, Nairobi, Kenya
A “call for action” issued on June 1st 2023 by Universities and research organisations across Africa and Europe [ the African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA), The Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities (The Guild) and the Association of African Universities (AAU) ] urges the African Union and the European Union to embrace a comprehensive, long-term vision for the Global Gateway’s AU-EU Innovation Agenda and pilot an integrated Africa-EU Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI) Programme for the period 2023-2027.
"AU-EU Centres of Excellence are to boost the institutional capacities of universities and research organisations across Africa and Europe to perform excellent collaborative research, develop joint training programmes, foster mobility, enhance the policy and socio-economic impact of research, and frame investments in research infrastructures."
"With funding drawn from the Global Europe/NDICI instrument, the primary beneficiaries of the AU-EU Centres of Excellence should be African universities and research organisations. At the same time, the embedded partnership with European institutions of each Centre will contribute to fostering African institutions’ success rate in Horizon Europe and Erasmus+, and the excellence component will contribute to building a pool of excellent researchers at all career stages, including for ARISE (African Research Initiative for Scientific Excellence), in all parts of Africa. This will enhance the resources and sustainability of the AU-EU Centres of Excellence."
the coordination of the ‘Scientific and technological support to the Regional centres of Excellence related to Green Transition’ seeks to establish close relations with local, national, and regional governments in Africa and Europe, as well as the private and civil society sectors, to facilitate the uptake of science for policy and socio-economic developments.
Changing context of research and scholarship in Africa today
"Emerging on the continent is a robust and active evidence-informed policy making (EIPM) movement and networks led by African research institutions such as: the Partnership for African Social and Governance Research (PASGR), the African Population Health Research Centre (APHRC), the African Institute for Development Policy (AFIDEP) and a set of other institutions in the Monitoring and Evaluation field. Also, the world of the business-driven research enterprises is growing rapidly in Africa not only through the big Accounting/Management Consulting firms who have entered the arena of research contracting but also through the increasing expansion of research contracting in the portfolios of the big bilateral donors and the proliferation of research-contracting firms across Africa today". [Tade Akin Aina (2022) Policy Analysis and Innovation: Why the Humanities and the Social Sciences Matter for Social Transformation in Africa ]
Policy research & the regional economic communities
The regional economic communities in Africa such as the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the East African Community (EAC) Southern African Development Community (SADC), the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the Economic Community of Central African States (ECCAS), the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) will increasingly need the advice from policy research emanating from green transition and circular economy research.
RCoEs conducting political economy research have the potential to guide:
- Policy processes around food systems transitions and agroecology;
The policy processes around food systems transitions and agroecology (AE) require a specific research evaluation and analysis. Donors and in particular the European Commission and the EU member states are keen to understand how possible obstacles in mainstreaming the AE approach are addressed - Policy processes around agribusiness funding;
The policy processes around agribusiness funding require a sustained research evaluation and analysis as investors in the agri-food sector need to reorient existing funding toward transformative innovation. - Measures to overcome Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT) and Non-Tariff Barriers (NTBs).
By understanding the specific requirements and barriers faced by African exporters, research can identify strategies to align production and processing practices with existing international standards. This includes developing guidelines for product design, labelling, packaging, and waste management that comply with international norms while promoting circular principles.
- Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA): Although not a specific RCoE, CODESRIA is an independent pan-African research organization dedicated to the promotion of social science research and the development of the social sciences in Africa.
- African Centre for Migration & Society (ACMS): Located at the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, the ACMS conducts research onmigration, displacement, and social transformation in Africa.
- Makerere Institute of Social Research (MISR): Based at Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda, MISR is a leading interdisciplinary research institute in social sciences, humanities, and arts in East Africa.
- Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research (WiSER): Also affiliated with the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, WiSER is a renowned research institute focusing on critical social sciences and humanities scholarship.
- Institute of African Studies (IAS): Based at the University of Ghana in Accra, Ghana, the IAS promotes research, teaching, and public engagement in African studies, including social sciences, humanities, and arts.
- African Centre for the Study and Research on Terrorism (ACSRT): Based in Algiers, Algeria, the ACSRT focuses on the study of terrorism, radicalization, and violent extremism in Africa.
Shared report during the webinar:
- By contributing to a better objective assessment of research systems for social sciences in developing countries, the Doing Research program, in a network of close partnerships with national research institutions, aims to expose weaknesses and shortcomings that can be addressed through better-informed national research policy, and what might be levers of change.
- Building on the current discourse on knowledge systems, the program puts forward a full-fledged definition of what a research system is, and operationalizes it to investigate the national environment for social science research, based on the best possible evidence, in three main dimensions: context, actors, and systemic features.
- Download Doing Research Assessment Framework and Indicators.
- The social science research-to-policy linkages can be best described as weak. Nigeria has not fully adopted evidence-based policymaking; most of the decision-making processes tend to be framed around political and ideological considerations, with little or no reference to hard evidence.
- International donors could support the establishment of a Centre of excellence to assess, benchmark, monitor and evaluate the SSR system, similar to the system of African Higher Education Centres of Excellence steered by the Association of African Universities and supported by the World Bank across several disciplinary areas. (page 16)
- Most research organizations either do not have a research support office or, in many cases where they do exist, such offices are short-staffed or inefficient. As a result, researchers spend too much time on bureaucratic responsibilities that the administrative support office should otherwise absorb. The creation or strengthening of offices that provide research support services would significantly improve the efficiency of the SSR system. (page 17)
Related:
The programme has had two phases – the first, showcased on TransformationsToSustainability.org – was financed almost entirely by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) and involved the funding of 38 seed grants and three major international research projects, or ‘Transformative Knowledge Networks’ between 2014 and 2019, with a research budget of 3.7m EUR.
In the second phase, the ISC, with the support of Sida, has joined forces with the Belmont Forum and NORFACE to jointly fund a set of 12 international research projects which run from 2018 to 2022 with a research budget of 11.5m EUR. The activities and outputs associated with the current projects are showcased on a dedicated website: t2sresearch.org.
24 November 2023. The urgent need to integrate research, policy and practice for transformations to sustainability
The ISC held its first in a series of Global Knowledge Dialogues in Cape Town, South Africa on the margins of the World Science Forum. More than 120 Member representatives from 40 countries attended the dialogue, which included partnerships with the Organization of Women Scientists for the Developing World (OWSD), and the Global Young Academy (GYA) and international representation from Australia, Malaysia, Japan, Turkey, Iran and the United Kingdom. INGSA chapter members and Future Earth representatives also attended the afternoon session.
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