Risky business: capacity-building in collaborative research

Abstract

The concept of capacity-building, originating in studies of economic development, operates as a powerful metaphor in arguments promoting collaborative research in education. This chapter interrogates the concept of capacity-building in that context by exploring the apparent contradiction of seeking to promote collaborative research in an increasingly competitive research funding environment, and then by raising ethical questions relating to who might control capacity-building agendas, and who might benefit from capacity-building endeavours. Drawing upon our experiences together in a number of differently sized collaborative research teams, we argue against a deficit conceptualisation of capacity-building that sees individual researchers as partly empty vessels that need filling. Rather, capacity-building through collaborative research is conceptualised as a process of empowering, equipping, informing and inspiring one another to continue to explore new dimensions in one another’s respective fields of interest. This view resonates with so-called capability approaches that conceptualise capacity-building as a “kind of freedom” (Sen, 1999). We contend that embracing this conceptualisation of capacity-building has the potential to enhance the quality and quantity of research outcomes, but also involves a certain degree of risk that needs to be acknowledged and addressed.