A Multi-perspective Study of China-Western Research Partnerships in Economics and Education

The presence of Chinese researchers in global social science has expanded rapidly yet their lived experiences are underexplored. Globally active Chinese researchers have a range of motives for collaboration; and their collaborations are vectored by the heterogenous logics of national and global social science, varying reciprocities and divisions of labour, and relations of power that are often but not always asymmetrical. In recent years researchers have been encouraged to work globally in English language frameworks, while at the same time to increase their endogenous orientation. This study explores the epistemic evolutions and relations of power of Chinese researchers and their Western collaborators using multi-perspective interviews (MPIs), i.e. gathering data from both sides of research partnerships. Five Chinese and six Western researchers engaged in five partnerships in Economics and Education were interviewed. The study finds that China-Western collaborations face constraints but also invite new forms of reflexivity. Divisions of labour evolve over time while perceptions of the research process are largely congruent. Collaboration is more readily sustained in global Economics, with its universal (albeit Western) episteme, than in Education where national/local contextualisation plays a larger role. Senior Western/more junior Chinese dyads are common in the participant group; while power asymmetries largely remain salient, different perspectives are sustained. Chinese scholars rework Western theories in local contexts, and there are mutual learning and epistemic reciprocity. Instances of bidirectional learning challenge centre-periphery models of global social science and underline the potentials of China ‘going out’ and pluralistic knowledge co-creation.