Advancing transformative research collaborations between Africa and the rest of the world
28 June 2024
We are delighted to invite you to save the date for a 2 part, interactive workshop in Brussels’s EU Quarter this November, convened jointly by the University of Bristol and the Coimbra Group, to present and discuss the Africa Charter for Transformative Research Collaborations.
The Africa Charter
Launched in July 2023 in Windhoek, Namibia, the Africa Charter was co-created by Africa’s major higher education and science constituencies, and co-facilitated by the University of Bristol’s Perivoli Africa Research Centre (PARC), the University of South Africa and the University of Cape Town.
The Charter’s 10 principles seek to advance a transformative mode of Africa-global North research collaborations — one that redresses the multiple layers of power imbalances in the production of scientific knowledge — as an entry and leverage point for more just global scientific effort in which African scholars, institutions and knowledges take their rightful place.
The Charter’s 6 aspirations call for structural change — in policy and regulatory frames, and guidelines of Higher Education Institutions, funders, publishers, research assessment and science governance bodies — to ensure that such a transformative collaboration mode is established as a benchmark and, progressively, as standard practice within the scientific community and beyond.
The Coimbra Group was amongst the first signatories, which now number more than 100 Institutions.
The Workshop
The 1st part of the workshop will foster discussions on the relevance and translation into practice of the Africa Charter’s principles in the evolution of Europe-Africa research collaborations. The 2nd will explore implications of the Charter’s aspirations for the further shaping of Africa-Europe research and innovation policy and funding, including within the Africa-EU Partnership and AU-EU Innovation Agenda.
The event will be of relevance to university rectors/vice-chancellors and vice-rectors for internationalisation and research, academics involved in Africa-Europe research collaborations, and staff active in the area, policymakers and funders, and the wider R&I stakeholder community. Speakers will include representatives of the University of Bristol and Coimbra Group, key partners in Africa and Europe, and the EU Institutions. Further details will follow soon, however registration is already open here.
The 1st part of the workshop will take place from the middle of Wednesday 6 until the middle of Thursday 7 November and include a networking reception. The 2nd part of the workshop will be from the middle of Wednesday 6 November until mid-afternoon. We hope that you will be able to join us!