Bridging the Gap: Fostering Cross-Border Intra-African Research Collaboration Among South African Universities

This paper explores the structural issues within South African research-intensive universities that impact intra-African academic collaboration efforts. While there is an extensive network of partnerships between institutions of the Global North and Global South, cooperation and network collaborations among and between institutions in Africa are disproportionately low. Despite university strategies and policy commitments that emphasize the importance of decolonised internationalisation and Africa-centred education, the present study reveals a starkly different reality. Based on a survey of 11 research-intensive institutions in South Africa, the study finds that the support structures at individual institutions exhibit a striking absence of coordination and shared strategies in facilitating these collaborations.