A new initiative is underway to explore and address the disparities in power dynamics between think tanks in the Global North and the South. The goal is to foster more balanced and fair collaborations within research partnerships.
Does this sound familiar? I bet it does.
There seem to be many such projects currently in progress. Leading international or global development research funders are investing in promoting new and more equitable forms of partnerships between Northern and Southern think tanks.+
This isn’t new. For years, international development funders encouraged and even conditioned funding to Northern international development think tanks on the basis of their collaboration with local partners. Unfortunately, instead of transformative reforms, unequal and unfair relationships ensued. I wrote about unfair contracting relationships between Northern and Southern think tanks back in 2014 partly in response to what I had observed in the sector.
More thoughtful efforts emerged later. In 2021, On Think Tanks published a series of lessons learned by AidData in building more equitable partnerships, funded by the Hewlett Foundation. Other significant bilateral funders, including the Canadian International Development Research Centre (IDRC) and USAID, are also supporting similar efforts to address these inequities.
This now is part of a wider agenda to shift international development funding and power directly to local think tanks (and other stakeholders). For example, USAID and Hewlett have partnered with the Center for Global Development (CGD) for the new Evidence Localization Initiative with similar intentions:
As part of USAID’s commitment to expanding locally-led development, this new partnership will shift more leadership, ownership, decision-making, and implementation to local people and institutions, who have the capability, networks, and credibility to drive change in their own countries and communities.
OTT is an active participant. Not only have we long supported local think tanks and networks and advocated for more, and, direct funding for them, but we are also working with a group of education research funders, the African Education Research Funders Consortium, interested in, among other things, righting the wrongs of a system that makes, in this case, African researchers and research centres the junior partners of every collaboration with Northern based peers.
More recently, with funding from IDRC, Southern Voice and the Institute for Development Studies (IDS) in the UK, are pursuing a project to address disparities in the relationship between Northern and Southern think tanks. A recent paper outlines their approach, and Southern Voice has issued a broad call for experiences to help inform the study.+
In this context, I wish to offer a critical perspective on the conversation; and invite comments as well as support and criticism for my arguments.
Here is my provocation statement:
Unless they make fundamental changes to their design, I doubt most initiatives working to deliver more equitable partnerships will result in the transformative changes they promise.
I have no doubt about the capacity and integrity of many of the people involved in these efforts to promote more equitable partnerships. I know many of them personally, and I expect that they genuinely want to make a difference.
My perspective is informed by close to two decades of careful engagement with the think tank community and my experience in several North-South partnerships on both sides of the divide. As I will show later, this experience is full of mistakes and lessons that have shaped this opinion.
What is the problem?
As I see it, the unequal relationships that these efforts aim to address operate in at least three interrelated dimensions:
- Decision-making influence: Decisions at the global level that affect everyone, and the South in particular, made by UN institutions, multilateral and regional development organisations, Global North foundations, and bilateral funders, and governments are primarily influenced by the advice from Global North think tanks and research centres.
- Power within partnerships: When Southern and Northern researchers collaborate the former are often forced (or have no choice but) to accept terms of engagement that make them junior partners by default; sometimes relegating them to case study authors or “plus ones” at global events.
- Funding flows: Monies flow primarily through Northern partners to the South, perpetuating organisational capacity divides and influencing the roles Southern think tanks can play in partnerships and global debates.
There are, of course, other elements to this problem. I will not address them all in this article.
For instance, there is the issue with Northern international development think tanks directly intervening in the policy and political spaces of other countries. But this is a deeper problem about the aid industry’s failure to see itself as a sometimes disruptive political agent.
Critically, I would also not want to brush aside the way that some Southern think tanks and researchers have gamed the system to their advantage. For instance, by using their Southern identity and Northern connections to attract funding, gain power within a partnership, and raise their voice in global academic and decision-making spaces.
It would be patronising to treat everyone in the South as powerless victims.
As a Peruvian who has made a career in and among Northern think tanks and the international development sector, I am not a neutral observer. A more personal and emotional element runs through all the dimensions above, and it relates to a sense of fairness.
Being treated as the junior partner for no other reason than our origin is hard to accept.
I remember stumbling on a private note that my line manager at ODI made when he hired me: he more or less said that my MSc from LSE gave me the credibility that my Bachelors from Universidad del Pacifico (UP), in Peru and unknown to him, did not.+
More recently, I had to bite my lip and turn the camera off to avoid a rude reaction as Northern researchers patronised my team on project management (when they were late with their part of the project), lectured us on the “ways” of Northern academic organisations (when they had made rookie mistakes on the framing of the research project or their choice of research methods – against our advice), or belittled some of our consultants’ work because of the ‘poor clarity’ of their written English (second or third language to them).
I am lucky to know what lurks behind the seemingly perfect facades of many of these Northern organisations; and I can’t be gaslighted. But it is no less uncomfortable to be on the receiving end of this kind of behaviour.
Discussions about equity are not simply technical or procedural: they are also emotional. My impression is that some parties involved in these discussions find it easier to either speak of “systemic change”, “decolonising partnerships” or “fostering equal partnerships” or resort to either knee-jerk reactions or unnecessarily long and protracted processes in an effort to be seen doing something, than to recognise prejudice and most likely, a lack of interest in and ignorance of differences-cum-rudeness that may underlie their actions.
This blunt honesty is rarely found in formal discussions about partnerships. Everyone is polite to one another. Past sins are forgotten. But, eavesdrop over an all-Southern table over lunch at an international development research conference and you will get a very different story.
Old patterns in new collaborations
These lunch break conversations among Southerners are full of frustration about how many of these efforts are developing. The general view is that although on paper new forms of collaborations are being supported, old patterns persist. In this article, I want to address three as a means to introducing an alternative line of conversation:
- The same participants: From the South, participating think tanks, research centres, or researchers almost entirely focus on domestic and mainstream policy issues: health, education, fiscal policy, macroeconomic policy, security, etc. From the North, on the other hand, participating think tanks are still typically focused on international development or regional studies.
- The same, but still different, motivations: Bluntly speaking, Northern organisations participate to maintain their relevance as their traditional funders shift their funding to Southern think tanks. Southern organisations, on the other hand, often participate because their funders or Northern partners ask them to—with little expectation that things will change, experience tells them.
- The same control under a tiny minority of think tanks: A very small group of Northern organisations typically still leads and controls these efforts because they hold the purse, are closer (professionally and personally) to the funders, and are the most concerned about the changing context. But they are not representative of all think tanks.
These points are problematic, as I explain below.
1. The wrong partners
The Southern Voice and IDS paper sets the context of their efforts within the “research for development” space. They define ‘research for development’ as studies addressing critical development challenges serving disadvantaged communities and funded by international development aid or philanthropy.
In this space, Northern organisations often present themselves as a necessary partner for Southern think tanks to reach global decision-making spaces.+ But this role is increasingly losing its relevance. The emergence of China or India in global spaces, the strength of networks like Southern Voice (the largest cohesive think tank network) and the growth of new global affairs think tanks across the South means that having an office in London, DC or Brussels no longer offers added value.
Furthermore, the term ‘research for development’ is unfamiliar to most researchers and policymakers; it is only used in the international development sector, mainly in the Global North.+
In Britain, research on disadvantaged communities in the North of England is called research—or policy research. In Peru, research on disadvantaged communities in the Amazon basin is also called research—or policy research.
The term ‘research for development’ only comes up when the North works on the South – as in the international development sector. For instance, in Britain, fiscal policy or education policy research in Sub-Saharan Africa would be classed as part of the international or global development policy field – regardless of who does it; but in Sub-Saharan Africa, fiscal policy is just fiscal policy and education is just education. Health is health, urban planning is urban planning, etc. In other words, it is just policy research.
This difference is crucial.
Policy research is inherently political, and politics are primarily local. Fiscal policy, education, and health policies everywhere are highly political issues, capable of sparking national protests and political disputes – as we have recently seen in Kenya and Bangladesh or France and Britain.
International development policy discussions, on the other hand, don’t elicit the same responses. There were no protests in the UK after DFID (the Department for International Development) was merged into the FCDO (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office).
International development think tanks do not deal with the same (capital P) Politics as the rest of the think tanks. This has huge implications for their agendas and ways of working.
At the same time, governments in the South are now more active consumers of evidence and advice and increasingly choose sector experts, regardless of where they are, over international development experts.
I am reminded of what a Malawian health policymaker once told me:
Why would I want to learn about managing our health system’s pharmacies from DFID? I want to hear from the NHS.
In other words, they want to learn from and work with peers.
Therefore, if we want more meaningful and transformative knowledge partnerships between Northern and Southern think tanks, the more obvious international partners for a think tank are other think tanks working in the same fields and focusing on their own politics: Northern or Southern.
Domestic policy think tanks with domestic policy think tanks; international relations or foreign affairs think tanks with international relations or foreign affairs think tanks.
However, today’s partnerships almost always involve international development think tanks in the North and domestic think tanks in the South, regardless of the fact that they inhabit completely different realities.
The Southern Voice—IDS report illustrates this. The interviewees from the South are almost entirely from domestic policy think tanks, while the interviewees from the North are almost entirely from international development think tanks or funders.
When an education think tank in Peru recently asked me for contacts in Europe, I suggested think tanks like Fundació Bofill and the Education Endowment Foundation. It did not occur to me that they would want to partner with an international development think tank, and they didn’t. Why North and South?
This is another critical question to address. Why are we worrying so much about the relationship between Northern and Southern think tanks? Is this the most important type of relationship for think tanks? There are far greater advantages in promoting partnerships between think tanks in the Sahel or the Amazon basin, along the crime routes between Latin America, West Africa, and Europe, or in trade blocks like APEC.
The answer is in who is driving the conversation and why.
2. Different motives to partner
In public, these initiatives claim that both Northern and Southern think tanks share the same motives for joining efforts.
In fact, this is not necessarily true.
When I have asked Southern think tank leaders why they are part of efforts to study and develop more equitable partnerships – or why they keep partnering – with Northern international research think tanks instead of more appropriate domestic ones, their answers can be grouped into the following three (these are real answers):
- The funder asked us to join the project – and we need to secure their funding.
- This is what they [the think tank] want to do as part of another project we are working with them on – and they hold the contract for that project.
- When we asked our funder for partners in the North, they introduced us to international development think tanks.
These answers reveal worrying issues of agency, funding control, and very limited international development funder-think tank relationships:
- Agency: Right from the start, the agency of most of these efforts to rethink and develop new more equitable partnerships is with the Northern organisation seeking a new partnership model.
- Funding control: In most cases, Northern think tanks manage the funds aimed at developing more equitable partnerships. Sometimes, the argument is that these projects will help build the capacity of the Southern partners to access funds directly in the future.
- Limited networks: Why don’t Southern think tanks find themselves new partners in the North? Not for lack of trying. However, often their only connection to Northern policy research communities is through their funders and international development think tanks or international development study programmes with broad alumni networks. Northern funders typically only work with international development think tanks – and vice versa. Even when the funder has both domestic and international programmes, these rarely – almost never – collaborate.
I have never come across a Southern think tank that would prioritise increasing or allocating its limited funds to help a Northern international development think tank be a better partner. Why would they? It is not their responsibility to help them. They have enough with the many more pressing challenges they deal with.
But this is exactly what these projects are making Southern organisations do.
3. A tiny group of think tanks still controls the conversation
Besides controlling the funding for these efforts, Northern organisations control the conversation.
Right now there are more people googling about Pad Thai in Bolivia than about the SDGs.
I love this phrase by Werner Hernani from Fundación ARU at the TTI Knowledge Exchange in Bangkok. It sums up the huge divide between what matters to the international development research community and to domestic policy communities.
Discussions about equitable partnerships are almost entirely driven by donors and their Northern grantees.
These conversations use terms and categories that do not always apply outside the US or Western Europe, making it harder to address complex power dynamics within the South. In the US, conversations about equity are often framed using racial dimensions with terms like “black-led or non-white-led organisations” or assumptions about the causes of inequality that are entirely US-centric.+
Furthermore, the organisations involved in these efforts represent a tiny minority of think tanks. First of all, international development think tanks are a tiny minority within the think tank communities in the North.
Second, most think tanks in the South do not partner with Northern think tanks—and vice versa. Their day-to-day activities are dominated by efforts to navigate already complex local political dynamics. Even if their funders are foreign, their partners are other local or regional think tanks, NGOs, the private sector, social movements, local and national governments, etc.
Third, there are thousands of think tanks in the US, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Africa, MENA and Asia which never engage with or participate in international development spaces or projects involving organisations in another country.
And there are many other think tanks whose international engagements are focused on much more equal relationships on the basis of ideological affiliations (e.g. Atlas Network) or sectorial (e.g. the Council of Councils) or disciplinary expertise (e.g. LASA) but exist outside (or are independent of) the international development sector.
Not surprisingly, most Southern think tanks we talk to have never heard of – or do not care about – terms like “equitable partnerships,” “decolonising development” or, even, “research for development”. They have other more pressing things to worry about.
We risk, therefore, awarding legitimacy to the results of exercises that involve a non-representative handful of think tanks, research centres and researchers globally – the tip of nothing.
Finally, the leadership of Northern international development centres feels uncomfortable, too. It’s the old “doing development differently” but “with the same people” and “with the same tools.”
A personal experience
I want to use my own experience, this time on the side of a Northern think tank, to further illustrate these points – and show that I am not all above fault.
Back in the 2000s, I helped set up and run the Evidence-Based Policy in Development Network (EBPDN) at ODI. The design of the network was inspired by Simon Maxwell’s airline alliance model for equitable partnerships.
The premise of the partnership was that ODI would handle policy discussions in the UK and the EU, while think tanks like CEPA in Sri Lanka or CIPPEC in Argentina would engage in South Asia and in Latin America. We had partners in Africa and South East Asia, as well.
The network was a pioneer in the evidence-informed policy field but failed as a partnership of think tanks. Several factors explain this:
- Wrong partners: ODI could never truly represent the UK or Europe. We incorrectly assumed that our international development expertise was a match for the national or sectorial expertise of our partners. The idea that a British think tank could speak for Europe was also naïve; just as suggesting that an Argentinean think tank could do so for Latin America. CIPPEC, for instance, did not have the mandate to work outside of Argentina. In addition, everyone in the network except ODI were domestically focused. The ebpdn needed domestically focused think tanks like IPPR, Demos, or RUSI in the UK, and similar organisations in the US and other countries in Europe to match the focus of the other members; or international development think tanks in Latin America, Africa and Asia (which would not make much sense – and are not easy to find).
- Partners’ motivations: The core scope of the EBPDN (learning about and promoting evidence-informed policy in development) wasn’t central to the other members. It wasn’t even central to ODI, which no longer has the RAPID programme that spearheaded this work. Think tanks undertake research to inform policy; focusing too much of their time on how they do this isn’t an efficient use of resources – just as asking them to focus on how Northern organisations can be better partners is not the best use of their time. A network with a sectorial focus (e.g. education or agriculture) might have had a better chance. ODI had another motivation, though. We gained from being able to draw from and claim to be part of a network of think tanks in the Global South. We used this in our funding proposals. This is why the ebpdn did not include think tanks from across Europe or the US. Doing so would have diluted ODI’s advantage.
- Funding control: ODI controlled the money for the network. Despite our best efforts, other network members always saw us as their funders or clients—never their partners.
Around the same time, another network emerged at ODI: the European Think Tank Group (ETTG). The ETTG is still thriving on the back of a much more equitable partnership between peer organisations (international development think tanks in Europe).
I would like to think that the On Think Tanks programme’s success is greatly down to having learned a few lessons from this past experience: the Open Think Tank Directory is meant to help find all think tanks, our conferences actively encourage new connections to be made among peers, our research and learning opportunities help think tanks focus on what matters to them, and we spend a lot of time brokering relationships in private for think tanks and funders alike. But I recognise that all relationships are difficult – and it is impossible to be the perfect partner, all the time.
So what?
The journey towards more equitable research partnerships between think tanks in the Global North and South is fraught with challenges, but also holds potential for transformative change.
I recognise that current efforts to address disparities in power dynamics led or involving international development think tanks may be sincere and well-intentioned.
And better partnerships are necessary.
However, these initiatives fall short of their potential due to ingrained patterns that favour working with the same very few Northern international development think tanks and Northern leadership and perspectives. Inadvertently, they perpetuate the very inequities they aim to dismantle and dismiss a much greater and richer experience that lies beyond the international development sector.
To truly foster equitable partnerships, it is essential to reevaluate who participates, on whose terms, and for whose benefits. By addressing these questions, we may maximise the possibility that conversations about equity are meaningful, relevant, and productive—and not just a way to legitimate business as usual.
In my opinion, the future lies in letting think tanks make their own choices – and succeed or fail in the process.
Funders can support this by:
- Leaving it to Southern think tanks: Empower Southern researchers and think tanks to develop fair partnerships by simply shifting the agency, control, and funding directly to them. They know what they want.
- Not distracting them from their missions: Leave the introspection, heavy lifting and the cost of figuring things out to the organisations that created the unequal partnerships in the first place. Do not distract Southern think tanks from their already difficult missions or divert funds away from supporting them or funding their core research and policy influence work.
- Supporting new sectorial and politically coherent relationships: We must recognise that the most suitable Northern partners for Southern think tanks are their sectorial and political peers: who work within similar domestic or international policy spaces, rather than international development think tanks by default. When establishing or supporting networks, funders should focus on concrete policy objectives, sectorial expertise, disciplinary focus or ideological preferences rather than imposing an arbitrary ‘the Global South’ or ‘Africa’ or ‘North-South’.
- Stop obsessing about North-South partnerships: Local or regional partnerships may be far more important for think tanks and for their missions. Developing and sustaining them present their own challenges and opportunities. Addressing them, however, is coherent with Southern think tanks missions.
- Breaking the monopoly: Funders and Southern think tanks should break loose from the networks that limit their options and perpetuate the monopoly of expertise held by a handful of Northern international development think tanks. Funders in the Global North need to cultivate relationships with researchers and think tanks with the sectorial expertise, economic and political positioning or skills that their Southern grantees have – or need.
- Embracing new roles: Northern funders (and international development think tanks) should adopt a more supportive role, facilitating connections and providing resources without imposing their own frameworks, organisational priorities, missions, and timeframes.
Finally, we need to recognise that the think tanks involved in these relationships are a small minority of the global think tank community. They face more important and pressing challenges.
So what can Northern international and global development think tanks do? Find out what here.