Doing harm: the impact of UK’s GCRF cuts on research ethics, partnerships and governance

Abstract

In spring 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, research projects funded by the UK’s Global Challenges Research Fund (GCRF) were subjected to budget cuts. The cuts were the result of UK government’s decision to reduce its Official Development Assistance (ODA), which had devastating effects for humanitarian, development and research work. This article draws on focus group discussions with project teams working on three large GCRF-funded projects to explore the effects of these cuts. The article documents how the cuts curtailed project aspirations and impact, had a negative toll on the mental health of researchers, and imperilled the trusting relationships upon which international research collaborations are built. The article argues that the cuts expose the shallow commitments to research ethics and equitable partnerships of powerful actors in the UK research ecosystem, including research councils and government. In ‘doing harm’ via these cuts, the article explores the failure of research governance structures and the continued coloniality underpinning the UK’s approach to researching ‘global challenges’.

How are Research for Development Programmes Implementing and Evaluating Equitable Partnerships to Address Power Asymmetries?

“…Finally, we need to consider the limitations to fostering and evaluation ‘equitable’ partnerships given some of our findings speak to deeply entrenched power asymmetries, including those resulting from colonial histories, funding streams, knowledge hierarchies and paternalism. Some have argued that building equitable partnerships within this context is impossible, because the colonial model of GCRF “maintains paternalistic and colonial assumptions around Northern researchers solving problems located in the South and building Southern research capacity” (Nwako et al 2023 , p. 14).…”

“…The Hubs conduct world-class research to improve outcomes for marginalised people in LMICs by working with a large number of academic and non-academic partners in a wide variety of geographies in LMICs (Table 1 ). At the time of writing, the Hubs are in their third year and have faced multiple crises, including: the Covid-19 pandemic; unexpected budget cuts of up to 70% as part of the UK government’s reduction in foreign aid spending in 2021 (Brien and Loft 2022 ; Nwako et al 2023 ); various national environmental and socio-political crises within partner countries (including the Taliban regime taking over in Afghanistan in 2022 and flooding in Sierra Leone in 2019 and 2022). These multiple crises led to interruptions to field work and consequently to partnership working.…”

Contingent valuation machine learning (CVML): A novel method for estimating citizens’ willingness- to- pay for safer and cleaner environment

“…The cost of science has become a major concern for scientists around the world, particularly in developing countries [39]. While conducting research is time-consuming and costly, researchers are confronted with the fact that research funding is dwindling owing to government cutbacks [40][41][42]. Because CVML can make use of open data platforms, the method can benefit significantly from the current trend of open science [43].…”

Evaluating Research for Development: Innovation to Navigate Complexity

“…In the process of developing this special issue, we, the editorial team, and all co-authors engaged in the GCRF programmes experienced a major funding crisis that served to sharpen our empirical understanding of the challenge of engaging in the contested spaces we have described here as areas of tension. In November 2020, in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the UK Aid budget was significantly reduced, and as a consequence the funding of the 12 signature GCRF Hubs was cut by up to 70% (UKRI 2021 ; Nwako et al 2023 ). For a period, the implementation teams faced high levels of uncertainty about future funding and the viability of the evaluation research.…”