UK-ASEAN Partnerships and Exchanges Baseline Research

The emergence of a nascent ASEAN HE space, the ASEAN+3 (China, Japan, South Korea) region, and the new Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) with increasing intra-regional student mobility are providing grounds for a ‘Global Britain’ to reinvest in its multilateral relationships. The impact of UK higher education (HE) internationalisation can be felt in East Asia, in the number of UK transnational education (TNE) arrangements and research collaborations in the region and the number of Asian students choosing to study in the UK.

This study aims to develop a greater understanding of policies, practices, emerging priorities and concepts of HE internationalisation in the UK and East Asia.

Three work packages with UK-based and Asia-based researchers will examine the scope, profiles and patterns of the existing HE, vocational education, and research partnerships at governmental and institutional levels by answering overarching questions:

1) What model of partnerships and types of UK TNE and collaborative research have been prioritised to date and how do they compare across East Asian countries?
2) How and by whom are quality and inclusion in partnerships defined and implemented?
3) How do the current UK-East Asia partnerships serve to inform future initiatives?
4) Which actors, ideas and principles will form and drive UK-ASEAN regional partnerships in a post-Brexit and post-pandemic era?

Combining British and Asian perspectives and theoretical resources from international relations and HE research fields, this mixed-method study will identify new and innovative concepts for future partnership initiatives that bring equity, mutual benefits and added value to all involved.

Project objectivesThis project will investigate the existing UK-East Asia partnerships by answering the overarching research questions defined above to meet the following objectives:
A. To map the landscape of UK-ASEAN, UK-ASEAN+3 partnerships and exchanges over the past 10 years in HE, Vocational Education and Training (VET), and Research and Innovation (R&I), highlighting the quantity, models and profiles of the partnerships at governmental and institutional levels;
B. To develop a deeper understanding of policies, practices, priorities of HE internationalisation by investigating ideas, principles, institutional arrangements, contexts and actors that foster or weaken UK-East Asia partnerships;
C.To provide policy makers and HEIs with reliable data and synthesised analyses to inform their policies for future multilateral or regional partnerships that will support the need for enhanced equity and inclusion, bringing mutual benefits and added value to all involved; and
D. To contribute original knowledge and methodological advancement to the field of HE research for analysing multidimensional HE partnerships at a large scale and under the pandemic.