SN 3 EP 12: Building Equitable Research Ecosystems Through African-Led Management Systems with Allen Mukhwana of Science for Africa Foundation

EPISODE SUMMARY

In this episode, Allen Mukhwana, Head of Programmes, Strengthening Science Ecosystems at Science for Africa Foundation, shares her journey from accidentally stumbling into research management to becoming a champion for equitable research partnerships across Africa. Allen reveals how strategic research management can dismantle colonial legacies in academia and build truly equitable partnerships with Global North institutions. This episode explores the critical role of research managers in creating sustainable ecosystems, the fight against tokenistic collaborations, and the promising future of African-led research sovereignty through science diplomacy and open access publishing reforms.

Here Are the Key Things to Look Out For:

Equitable Partnerships

 Allen unpacks why true collaboration must go beyond tokenism. African researchers and institutions bring intellectual leadership to the table and integrity in partnerships ensures that value is fully recognized.

 Empowering Research Managers

 Behind every strong research ecosystem are skilled managers. We explore why resourcing and professionalizing research management is essential to sustaining excellence in African institutions.

 Science Diplomacy & Open Access

 From colonial legacies to publishing monopolies, global research systems remain imbalanced. Allen highlights how science diplomacy can drive reforms that make open access and publishing more equitable.

 Valuing African Knowledge Systems

Research sovereignty means shaping agendas and redefining excellence on our own terms. This episode calls for a rethinking of how African knowledge is produced, shared, and valued globally.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

Intro:

Welcome to Mazungumzo – African scholarly conversations, a podcast that highlights the perspectives of various stakeholders in academia, and research fields across Africa through open dialogue or mazungumzo on scholarly communication in Africa.

Joy Owango

Welcome to Mazugumzo, African scholarly conversations, where we are joined an expansive list of African policy makers, scholarly and science communication specialists, innovators, and tertiary institution leads contribute to this realm of scholarly and science communication. I’m your host. Joy Owango, the Executive Director of the training center in communication capacity building trust based at the University of Nairobi, Faculty of Science and Technology. Today we are honored to sit with Allen Mukhwana, head of programs in science knowledge in society, at the science for Africa Foundation based out of Nairobi, and a dedicated champion for equitable research partnerships and institutional trends strengthening across Africa. Allen leads programs at the science for Africa Foundation that challenge the status quo, from the international research management staff development program rep, which is also known as REM pro Africa, both designed to reimagine how research management can truly serve African institutions with over 15 years of experience in academia NGOs and the private sector, Allen brings a rich, practical perspective on what it takes to move from short term fixes to sustainable African LED systems change. Welcome Allen. It’s a pleasure to have you here.

Allen Mukhwana

Thank you. Joy. It’s my pleasure to be part of this conversation.

Joy Owango

Fantastic. So, let’s start with your journey. How did you find yourself in the world of research management and building systems that support African science? What drew you in and kept you going?

Allen Mukhwana

That’s interesting joy. So very briefly, I actually could say that I stumbled into research management because I was working with this infectious diseases Institute at Makerere University, doing research and communication for the AIDS Information Center. And at that point, at one point, I was requested by our head of Institute to review the research program and look at particular there was a particular job within that research program, and they asked me if I could look at the job and whether I liked it or not. And so that’s why I say I stumbled into research management. So on, guessing into research management, really, I had a pool of scholars, a Clinical Scholars, and I had several number of grants to do research, and there was also a good number of clinical trials going on. And so, I got into research management from a very blind perspective, because at the time, this is 2010, at the time, there was no research management as a profession, and fairly outlined. And so, I got into the position and started thinking about, how do I organize this office that I’ve been given into an office that’s going to add value to the institute, but also importantly to the scholars that I were under my care. And so, I started reading about research management, because I had seen something from the US called the Society of research administrators International, and so said, reading, what are the skill sets required. Looking out for courses that I could take to upskill myself. But unfortunately, there was, there was none on the continent. We had one professional association, which was really in southern Africa, and I couldn’t be a member, because I was in East Africa. And then, you know, through all this, I decided to join international professional associations, and that’s how, really, I upskilled myself to understand research management and then be able to support the scholars that were in my research program. So it was, you know, you asked the question of what drew me to it, like I said, it was really me stumbling into it. But once I stumbled in, I found it very interesting, very, very interesting.

Joy Owango

Interesting. And I mean, like most careers, sometimes they find you, or you find them. And while, when you got into research management, what about the first observations you noted that may be more passionate about it to the point that now it has become a career?

Allen Mukhwana

Thank you. That’s interesting question, really. So, what happened is, I wasn’t in the clinical space, really, even if I was in the AIDS information treatment center, my role there was really to organize clinicians to respond clinicians within the city to respond to clinicians in the rural settings that didn’t have access to resources, so I’m not a clinician. So clearly it was, it was a new space, but now getting into research management, I had all this, mostly Clinical Scholars who were setting up their studies, and I needed to understand what they are doing. You can’t monitor someone if you don’t understand what they’re doing, right? You can’t hold them accountable for deliverables if you don’t understand their work. And so, I took it upon myself to begin to understand what is it we are doing, and what is it they are doing? What is it I’m doing for them, and how do I support them to deliver on their work so that the Institute is really positioned as a research institute. And so, I started reading around the USA Food and Drug authority. I read about the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology, Uganda National Drug authority, and started looking around East Africa. What’s Kenya doing in this space? What’s Tanzania doing? And I realized that there’s actually a whole ecosystem that regulates research. Now this regulatory ecosystem, is what guides the researchers that I was working with right? And yet, many of them actually had hard time to navigate that system. And so, I decided to organize an office beyond the scholars now to include beyond the Clinical Scholars now to include other scholars or researchers at Makerere University in the College of Health Sciences. And so, I decided to set up an office that would support the researchers, generally. And all this was really about me getting in touch with different people, me reading around certain subjects, enrolling in a clinical research evidence based medicine course, just to understand clinical research and what we should be looking out for. And then I joined. And several associations where we met and had a lot of peer learning, and the peer learning skills are what I brought to my job. Fortunately, I was already doing. I was already enrolled for an executive MBA, which really helped me shape, how do you set up an office that’s going to be sustainable in in an institution that’s not a profit making? And so that was, that was what drew me in and actually anchored me into realizing that I’m able to set up something that will stand the test of time and try. I can say happily that the office is still running it. It’s, it has evolved over the years with new people and a new technology. But it’s, it’s a pride to say that I was part of the formation of, what do we need in here? We need clinical monitors. We need project support staff. We need someone to oversee what’s happening with the grant’s teams, to look at what’s the pipeline of researchers? Because one of the challenges of researchers is that you have generations of very excellent researchers, and if you’re not growing your pipeline with researchers to be mentored, then you end up with huge gaps in your pipeline. That, of course, affects your research income and therefore affects your operations. And so, I was I was really fortunate to be now in an environment where leaders appreciated my efforts, and I had very good conversations with my immediate supervisor, called Professor Yukari Manabe and our executive director, who was Dr Cochino, and so they did encourage me to be innovative and put resources at my disposal to think through. How do we make the office sustainable? That meant, how do we bring in staff, train them to support researchers? Meaning, now you’re creating a kind of research management stuff that wasn’t there before, and it doesn’t matter what you call them, but as long as you’re creating this kind of stuff that is supporting the whole research enterprise, that means you really are creating a sustainable institution. And so, for me, that gave me the courage to stay in research management all the way. The other point, actually, after I left the infectious diseases Institute, why I stayed in research management is because I saw a lot of potential on the African continent, right? Why in two areas, one is that was a lot of research being done, but really not very coordinated, right? And the researchers themselves were struggling to do everything. And so, I realized that if we don’t support them, they will quickly get out of the research space, because it’s a lot of work, right? And then the second opportunity I saw is a career path for people who want to be within the research space, but not necessarily conduct the research, right? You are part of the research enterprise. You support the researchers. You supporting, looking for the funding, scanning the environment to see where the funding is. You’re part of the applications. You see the projects from start to finish and you see the results the publications, and then now lay later in life. The question for me is so beyond the publication, what next? What do we do with that research? These are things you learn on the job. Life experience in trying to grow the profession. And so I think at the moment, at science for Africa Foundation, my one of my roles is really to work with partners on the continent to grow the profession, the research management profession, and that, for me, is really exciting, talking to the different professional associations, talking to university leaders about creating a courses in this area, talking to regulatory body stunt, the importance of harmonizing a profession so that we are able  to support researchers so that there’s lots of production of research, and so that, that has kept me in this space for quite a long time,

Joy Owango

interesting. So, you’ve led initiatives like the international research management staff development program and the research management program in Africa aimed at addressing structural gaps in research support. Could you tell our listeners what these programs are all about, the system challenges they aim to address, and how we might start to change these challenges?

Allen Mukhwana

Thanks, Joy. So, the international research management staff development program, IRMSDP for short, is actually a cultural and skills exchange, and it’s a partnership with the Association of Research managers and administrators UK called AMA. So, in conceptualizing this program, one of the things we’re looking at the cultural and contextual differences between African institution and their especially north, global North partners and in Africa, let me just put this in context. In Africa, at a university, there’s certain culture that is not written anywhere, and if you’re not within the universities, you may not understand the hierarchical nature of the university and then there’s a lot of nuances on who does what right. So, the research managers that or administrators that had been recruited by universities, maybe I should say that several universities on the continent have realized the importance of research management, and so have recruited a cadre of staff to do that. But now these staff are, in the larger scheme of things, are quote, unquote, junior staff, they don’t influence policy or resource allocation in their universities, and so I realized that they are working with their global North partners, who are more recognized as part of the research enterprise at the university, and they have a contribution to changes within the research environment. And so, there’s always, there’s always delays or because of lack of understanding of where different people sits in the in the institution. And so, for me, in conceptualizing this program, was to say we need this cultural exchange. One is that the UK research managers come to the African universities, immerse themselves in the institution, understand how things work, and then the African research managers also go to the UK university. Expertise, immerse themselves within the space, and so they both understand, there’s a skills transfer, but then there’s also, importantly, contextual understanding, right? You can only collaborate if you understand each other. So that was one of that was one of the things. The second objective was, really, if we are partnering with global North partners, we must partner at the same level we both bring intellectual input that’s very truly yes in the in the research. However, if our institutions are not well resourced with staff who understand that actually, just because this is a global North partner, we are not inferior to them. They’re coming to us because we have a lot to offer. Yes, we are not data collectors on the continent.

Joy Owango

As I always say, that you’re not glorified data collectors.

Allen Mukhwana

We are not our PIs are not glorified data collectors. They are top notch researchers, very intelligent, and so our institutions must be conducive for them to actually fulfill their potential. And so for me, this program was really to say to our research managers. This is a role you must play, and you must uphold your institution at the level it ought to be held. It’s a giant. A knowledge giant. It’s with intellectual giants, and so support them to fulfill that potential. And so this was such a success, and people really appreciated what we’re trying to do, and we’ve had lots of support, and we are, you know, still trying to look for funding to scale up this program, because the evaluations really showed that it was very appreciated, not just by the research managers in Africa, but also their UK counterparts, because then they began to understand the quant. Context in which their colleagues work, but importantly, that they can’t do things at the last minute, sending proposals. Oh, yeah, please, so and so, please sign off as part of this collaboration. No, we need to have intellectual input in any production of knowledge.

Joy Owango

That is very true, and without said and done, what excites you about your current role at the science for Africa Foundation, and how does that align with your broader vision for research in Africa, particularly research management, in the context of what you just shared with us, the projects you’ve shared with us.

Allen Mukwana

I mean, this particular project is really, like I said, is addressing systemic disparities, and what we need to do is ensure fair and effective research collaborations, so equitable partnerships to also realize that research managers are actually a core component of the research life cycle, and there’s lots to contribute to it. That means that our institutions should also be able to resource a cadre of staff to support the researchers, beyond the infrastructure that is provided for researchers and that.

The other exciting thing is that my work with institutional leaders like vice chancellors, Deputy Vice Chancellors, directors of research, is the is the understanding that our institutions are supposed to continue the research Enterprise beyond the here and now, we must build research environments that attract even the young people to get into research. Research must be looked at as an exciting and attractive career that actually contributes to developing the continent. Yes, right, that our outputs in research are what will help us build our continent, and that actually we have very brilliant minds who we can attract to these institutions. So really empowerment, supporting academic research managers and support staff to ensure that our institutions are able to produce good research. Joy, I wanted to touch on equitable research partnerships. I think for me, it’s about framing, framing on inequitable equitability in research relationships, right? We want to understand the global research context. The resource constrained settings versus the highly resourced settings. What are the challenges? And how do we look at some of these challenges? And you do realize that there’s colonial legacies, and there’s trauma to that because our institutions are thought to be inferior. Just because there’s less resource, we there’s resource constraint, you know, and so for me, that is really something I’m looking at as part of my role equitability in research, and that we now need to grow long, you know, to grow long term visions and strategic positioning, robust research ecosystems for our institutions, right? And that we must rethink rankings in education. Yep, yeah, rankings of universities education as a commodity. Can we redefine what research excellence is? Yes? Can we acknowledge indigenous knowledge and so for me, it’s really about reversing the lens. Equitable partnerships from a global southern perspective, are really what I’m thinking through and how we can achieve that.

Joy Owango

I think what you’re actually telling me; it’s about research integrity. It’s when you talk about equitable partnerships, about integrity in these partnerships. Because for the longest time, we have been perceived when I say we, those of us in the Global South, we’ve been, we’ve been perceived as, as I said earlier, glorified data collectors, and then and we understand. We, I don’t say we understand, but we are cognizant of the challenges we face within our institute, whether it’s infrastructural or human resource or even financial so it’s so easy, unfortunately, to take advantage of those ecosystems, or even laws that do not support proper research management ecosystems so on policies. So, by the time you’re talking about equitable research partnerships. It’s also about telling our potential partners we need to get into these partnerships with an element of integrity. And it also speaks to one of the projects that we have at TCC, whereby we are training working with various governments, but training research ethics and review boards on equitable research practices, especially when it comes to publishing and partnerships. Because, you know, when people look at Integrity, they look at the integrity of the before the research. What boxes should I take so that everything is in line with the research and ethics review boards, but then it’s always the whole sphere. How is this partnership? How are we going to publish? What is our recognition in this process? So, what you’re talking about actually speaks true to some of the activities we are doing because the colonial trauma is real.

Allen Mukhwana

It is. And it’s subtle. Sometimes it’s subtle in the way it’s presented. When you think about it, why would Global North want to partner with global south institutions? It’s about the intrinsic value. You know. You know, scholarship, knowledge, feelings of achievement that are, you know, they view that. They will get that from the Global South.

Joy Owango

What I also said, there’s also an element of colonial guilt. This is a 10th topic.

Allen Mukwana

Yes, we need to, we will need to talk about decolonization of the mind, that the knowledge systems another day, because it’s a whole exciting area of work that we are venturing in and looking to understand how to break those chains. But back to an equitable partnership. We want value, attribution for everything that we do and joy. One of the things I insist on is that inequity is as is systemic. This continues to contribute to systemic iniquity, meaning that the power imbalance that defines the relationships that we have dominance of an exclusive research system that defines the rules of the game, right? And so, it defines knowledge production which theories and approaches dominate, dominate research processes whose knowledge counts. And then those relationships of tokenism, or because you have to have an African partner, and so I know so and so, so I can send them the proposal two hours to the closing date, and expect them to sign it off. So, it’s perfect path. What’s performance really representation of we are bringing in the underrepresented groups. We are facilitating their institutions and but their systems are really not good without that understanding. And that’s why I said in conceptualizing IRMSDP, it was we. We need you to understand each other so that when we are speaking. We speak from the same from the same level. We speak as equal partners. You understand how our policies work. We understand how your policies work, rather than because the money is coming to you and you want to align our policy to your settings. Who sets? Who gets to decide what is researched? Who is setting the agenda for research? So those are some of the, some of the things that I’m excited about looking at and joy. You did mention the work around the work we are currently doing around open research and how we are looking at how we are trying to, you know, use science diplomacy to champion equitable knowledge systems through global research publishing reforms. So that’s, that’s the other piece of work that I’m currently doing, and that’s a very exciting field, because it’s a field of really just ventured into and I feel very excited, because now we are talking the future of open access and what and what that means for research researchers in the Global South, right? And looking at, you’re looking at key issues like open access as a driver for sustainable development, looking at power imbalance in global publishing. I’m sure you are very aware of the dominance of Northern based publishers and frameworks in academic publishing, which, which simply reinforce a knowledge monopoly,

Joy Owango

African publishers or even global south publishers, yes and actually marginalize them,

Allen Mukhwana

And so, I’m really excited to be getting into this space to understand what are the African led initiatives and success stories, despite ongoing challenges.

Joy Owango

And you know, when you’re talking about science diplomacy, that is our role, so when you’re talking about science diplomacy, a few points came to my mind. Thanks to colonial guilt, you know, we are colonial guilt and, on our side, now reinforcing our research sovereignty. You know, we are demanding integrity in research practices and partnerships, and that should actually be the core of science diplomacy. You know, we shouldn’t look at science diplomacy as Yes, other than the diplomatic element of it. It needs to be, it needs to have a root with our colonial past, the consequences of that, and yes, how it has affected how research is conducted on the continent. The fact that we’re actually talking about we need better research practices. We need integrity in our partnerships. It means that it was not even considered in the first place it was, it wasn’t an issue in the past, until when we as researchers in the Global South, not necessarily Africa in the Global South, are demanding research sovereignty. We are demanding respect in the kind of partnerships we are creating. So, I think there is a paradigm shift, but then we need to root in colonial guilt with the science diplomacy, so that we are very clear what we want, so that it’s not an issue of, yes, this is our past. We are sorry, but this is how we are going to work. No, it needs to be really on our terms, respecting our research sovereignty, making sure that the partnership is equitable. So, those are the things that came to mind as you are explaining.

Allen Mukhwana

And I mean, it’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon, because there’s lots of iniquities that we must call out marathon. I don’t believe it’s going to be as slow as we thought previously, because you and I both understand the movement to demo and access, right? I think there’s been lots of conversations around how infra infrastructure has to be shared integrate open science into global agenda, and it should be by direction or not. Oh, you one area is open, and the other one is closed to the open partner, but really being equally sharing.  The science champion a global initiative on equitable publishing. Can we have? What are the biases in publishing, and how can we rectify those? I mean you, you did mention research integrity, and often, sometimes it’s reduced to just the publishing. I know publishing is a great a great piece of it because people want to put out their work, but they are often hindered by access to those journals. Usually, they are biases when the name is Owango versus some other name. So, how do we leverage science diplomacy to launch a global partnership or Alliance dedicated to reforming research publishing how do we get bodies like the UN funders, universities, publishing houses? Is to commit to support them on open access channels and platforms so that we are able to have open peer review, so that those biases can be broken, you know. So how do we support African and global south infrastructure. How do we get funding from, including from international bodies, to invest in the digital and institutional infrastructure for open science in Africa? How do we do this so that we change the narrative around the percentage of production coming out of Africa, right? These are some of the things that I’m now thinking around, and I can just share with you. We the science for Africa. Foundation partners with F1000 on now open access publishing called Open Research Africa, and you were part of the team that we’ve been working with to do a landscape analysis, to understand who else to partner with. How else to make open access really accessible for folk, for the African partners, how do we make publishing equitable, and how do we go forward and right and transition to diamond, open access, free to publish and free to access. So, this is, this is this is a phase of transition I’m excited to be part of. And I think this, this journey will lead us to eventually getting into equitable research collaborations, and also, importantly, increasing knowledge production on the continent and knowledge utilization.

Joy Owango

Okay, so now looking ahead, where do you see the biggest opportunities for collaboration between African research managers, funders and communicators to build research ecosystems that last and have you noticed any encouraging shifts in how funders or institutions are valuing African led research management.

Allen Mukhwana

That’s a very good one. So one thing I would say is, I’m part of, I represent the science for Africa Foundation on the essence group, which is a group of funders that fund health research and we have a working group on research management, and it’s Very exciting at the at the last essence meeting in Washington, DC in February of this year, where all the funders agreed and resolved that research management is critical and that it should be funded as its own item, rather than as an overhead. What this means is that they will put across resources, they will allow budgeting for research management as a line item, because they recognize the importance of building capacity for research management, especially in the Global South, because they also realize that you can’t have research excellence without the research management component, because the research managers are creating the environment for the research excellence. You can’t have the excellence without the support of the research managers. So that’s very exciting, and many funders across the globe have really recognized the importance of building this capacity in in the global south. So that’s one exciting bit. The second exciting bit is that we are growing a cadre of professionals. Because, like I said, I stumbled into research management people. That’s been what’s happening. But at the moment, the partners on the continent who are offering professional courses for research managers, meaning we are going to grow a cadre of professionals that will then be looking after our research enterprise on the collaboration with science communicators, maybe one thing I should highlight is that under research management, there is it’s a spectrum of functions, and some of which are research collaborations and partnerships, research communication and engagement, and which, of course, include dissemination and engagement with communities, engagement with industry, engagement with policy makers and so in growing the research management profession, I should say that we are also promoting research communication, or science communication, because it is part of the spectrum of functions that form what we refer to as research management. So, for me, that’s really exciting, and I see the profession growing. Things have changed. I was at conference recently, and I could see many abstracts from the Global South, and I was particularly interested in those that came from Africa, because, I mean, I keep looking out for those and that there’s more knowledge production in this space, and so thinking about building a body of knowledge on research management that that actually goes beyond the continent and taps into the global expertise. That really is exciting for me, because our knowledge is useful beyond our borders. For me, that’s really powerful,

Joy Owango

Okay, and that’s it. Thank you so much. Allen, this has been a very, very interesting conversation, and I believe we could end up talking for hours. Thanks for your insight and also your passion about research management, especially the integrity aspect of research management and partnerships. Thank you so much for making time to join us in mazungumzo.

Allen Mukhwana

Thank you joy. Thank you for having me. I appreciate the opportunity to share my thoughts and the vision for the work we are doing at the science of Africa Foundation,

Joy Owango

Fantastic. Have a good day. Bye.

Outro:

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