Citizens of somewhere: Examining the geography of foreign and native-born academics’ engagement with external actors

Cornelia Lawson, Ammon Salter, Alan Hughes, Michael Kitson

Research Policy · 2019 · Volume 48 · Issue 3

DOI: 10.1016/j.respol.2018.11.008

Abstract

This paper explores the geography of academic engagement patterns of native and foreign-born academics, contrasting how patterns of intranational and international engagement with non-academic actors differ between these two groups. We suggest that foreign-born academics will engage more internationally than their native-born colleagues, whereas native-born academics will have greater levels of intranational engagement. Drawing upon a large multi-source dataset, including a major new survey of all academics working in the UK, we find support for the idea that where people are born influences how they engage with non-academic actors. We also find that these differences are attenuated by an individual’s intranational and international experience, ethnicity and language skills. We explore the implications of these findings for policy to support intranational and international academic engagement.

Keywords

Academic engagement, International collaboration, Foreign-born and native-born scientists, National collaboration

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