Double Agendas in International Partnership Programs: A case study from an Ethiopian University

ABSTRACT

This paper explores the policy discourses underpinning an international higher education partnership involving a large Ethiopian university. Particular attention is given to a partnership programme established between an Ethiopian (EU) and a Norwegian (NU) university, and the main ideas and practices expressed and negotiated from an Ethiopian perspective. This study employs a theoretical framework based on critical policy analysis and a qualitative case study design using interviews and document analysis. The results illustrate how a loosely defined policy for international partnership in higher education frames the conditions and possibilities for this programme. Partnership in EU is based on policies that emphasise flexibility in various possibilities, but also with ambitions, foremost, to partner with a Northern university. In the EU, this partnership is viewed, mainly, as a means of academic growth and development while also convoluted with concerns about resource dilemmas and dependency. This partnership programme, therefore, appears to be based on contradictions from which a double agenda emerges: striving for mutuality versus avoiding dependency, and local needs versus global achievements.

KEYWORDS:

• Higher education
• international partnerships
• academic rationales
• double agenda

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kitaw Kassie

Kitaw Kassie is an Assistant Professor of International and Comparative Education. He is currently working as Instructor at Defence University, Ethiopia. He is also Head of the Educational Quality Assurance Strategy of Defence University.

Petra Angervall

Petra Angervall is a Professor of Education situated at the Department of Educational Development and Research at the University of Borås, Sweden. She is currently involved in research concerning higher education policy and gender equality, gender and leadership, just as critical perspectives on international partnerships. She is also the leader of the research group “Higher Education, Politics and Praxis” at the university.