Partnership-Sustainability Challenges

Walsh and Kahn (2010, p. 53) alert us that “a collaboration may last little longer than a passing dream, or it may endure for a lifetime and beyond.” Although even the most mutually beneficial collaborations can reach temporal limits, sustainability is a core component in symmetrical-partnership undertakings. In all transnational higher-education partnerships (THEPs), partners “need to be forward thinking and consider the sustainability of what they are doing” (Wanni et al. 2010, pp. 45, 47). The overarching challenge for transnational arrangements devoted to research and development is to remain in partnership long enough to build the mutual institutional capacity and human capabilities required for autonomous leadership and “ongoing professional development and renewal” (Crossley et al. 2005, p. 91). Durability enables THEPs to fulfill interinstitutional objectives and to maximize positive societal outcomes. In the asymmetrical partnership, the Northern university is prone to take its benefits (desired research permission, funded international students, trips for administrators, and sizeable overhead) and “run” (Shaeffer 2008, p. 38). Near symmetry in partnership design and management increases the likelihood that the required degree of sustainability will be attained.