Decolonizing research
Decolonizing Research
Another year in the journey of independence has passed. We have all the reasons to celebrate it with joy like every year. Social media are flooded with happy faces, culinary delicacies and natural beauties, all presented in a red-and-white theme.
Yet, one source of dissatisfaction seems to remain persistent. It concerns a perceived lack of association with the developed world in terms of science and technology. This year Indonesia assumes the prestigious G20 presidency, but one may wonder if the status of being one of the largest economies can be attributed to the knowledge possessed by the nation. It is the kind of knowledge that should be uniquely present within the Indonesian society, which determines the significance of the role that Indonesia plays in international relations.
One focus of attention, so it seems as it is quite debatable whether it has ever been given an appropriate attention at all, is the government’s policy on research and its tightly related higher education. From one political era to another, Indonesia has seen one overhaul followed by another in the organization, management and implementation of research and higher education institutions.
The most recent one is the establishment of the National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) in 2021, an overarching agency tasked to oversee research activities across the country. Observing the polemic in the media, the establishment of BRIN has been controversial. Today, one year afterwards, the criticisms seem to have become louder, if not harsher.
One should appreciate that many new elements that came along with the establishment of BRIN were well-intended. One example is the introduction of postdoc positions. Another example is a spirit newly accentuated for collaborating with foreign research organizations.
In other nations, postdoc is a common terminology that has been known for decades. The breakthrough insight into the double-helix structure of DNA in 1953 was a result of a postdoctoral research in the US. In China, the postdoctoral system was founded in 1985 after a Chinese American Nobel Laureate in physics, Tsung-Dao Lee, wrote two letters to the Chinese leadership in 1983 and 1984. He advised that China should establish centers for postdoctoral studies and develop a sound postdoctoral system.
What should be scrutinized in the BRIN’s initiative is whether or not the postdoctoral position is well integrated academically. It should give a perspective for a tenure (permanent) position to ultimately become a professor, either in the host university or elsewhere in another university. Definitely, to realize an impactful postdoctoral position, the rigid academic career structure in Indonesia needs an overhaul too.
Academic mobility within the archipelago should be encouraged and facilitated. This ultimately means that, for example, it should be reasonably possible for a professor to quit her job at a university in Bandung in order to grow her career at a university in Ternate. In doing so, she brings fresh funding to form a new research group, recruiting new PhD students and postdocs coming from not only Ternate, but also from all over the country. Such a move may be motivated by the desire to pursue new knowledge on a topic that is strongly related to the Ternate region.
Indeed, research should always begin with a desire, or even an ambition, stemming from a curiosity to find answers about the unknowns. Between the curiosity and the answers lie the questions that have to be formulated carefully.
A research proposal describes the route and necessary means to undertake the journey between questions and answers. New knowledge will result from everything encountered during the journey, including unexpected turns and crossings. Some of the new knowledge will emerge as another curiosity, new questions, which eventually lead to another research, and so forth. The professor orchestrates a symphony of research, gaining priceless coherent knowledge on a stepwise manner.
A similar phenomenon can commonly be found nowadays. However, the professor stays affiliated with his employer, a university in a foreign country, where Indonesian PhD students and postdocs are registered to conduct research in Indonesia. Of course, these students and postdocs also gain knowledge and skill from what they are doing, but these are only piecewise in nature.
The professor who orchestrates the research gains the unique coherent knowledge using piecewise findings delivered by his students and postdocs. This knowledge is not possessed by the Indonesian society. Is this a new form of colonialism?
BRIN’s view on international collaboration involving Indonesia is rather narrow, saying that Indonesia must deliver an equal financial share for an equal partnership. I would argue that it is not a matter of who funds the research and for how much.
It is a matter of who takes the initiative in formulating the research questions, drawing the route, and determining the required means. Foreign entities may participate by any means and by any amount, but the party who formulates the research questions is the one who will control the research, and therefore gain the knowledge coherently. Indonesian academics must be empowered to assume this responsibility.
Indonesia is a vast land and sea, rich of unknowns to be unraveled and transformed into tradable knowledge. The interaction between the disadvantaged weak and the privileged powerful in the 21st century is not about nutmeg or such like in the 17th century, but about unique knowledge that can be traded to ensure the standard of living of a nation.
With climate change becomes a harder boundary condition, where the survival of humanity itself is at stake, decolonizing research is crucial to preclude another form of colonialism taking shape, in which one dominates another based on knowledge. This is another kind of independence that must still be fought for.
