Knowledge Politics and Policies

Knowledge, understood to be the foundation on which societies coalesce and economies thrive, has become central to contemporary politics and policymaking across governance levels. This section is interested in theoretical, empirical, and comparative contributions that investigate the role of politics and policy in the multi-level, multi-issue, and multi-actor governance of knowledge. In focusing on role, we refer to effects that ideas (including political ideologies), actors (both individual and organisational, including political parties and transnational entities), policy instruments, and institutions have on the governance, creation, dissemination, and transfer of knowledge. Panels will be oriented around these roles, key empirical questions, theories or methodologies. The Section continues the work on knowledge policy domains from the past 10 ECPR conferences (previously under the titles ‘Politics of Higher Education, Research and Innovation’ and ‘Europe of Knowledge’). It continues to welcome scholars, globally and interdisciplinarily, from all theoretical and methodological approaches. Proposals should have a clear conceptual framework, describe research design, data and methods, as well as highlight the expected contribution. The following panels have all been pre-proposed by the chairs listed: 1. Political, societal, and legal threats to the state of academic freedom in Europe Chair and co-chair: Peter Maassen and Mari Elken (University of Oslo) Several recent analyses point to a variety of pressures on academic freedom in Europe. While structural infringements with academic freedom are usually aligned with illiberal democracies/autocratic regimes, both gradual processes of erosion and serious academic freedom incidents have been identified in liberal democracies. The panel invites theoretically grounded empirical analyses of the de jure and de facto state of academic freedom, and the political and legal initiatives to counter the ongoing threats to academic freedom in Europe and beyond. 2. AI politics and policy in uncertain times Chairs: Inga Ulnicane (University of Cambridge) and Tero Erkkilä (University of Helsinki) This panel invites theoretical and empirical contributions that focus on how AI politics and policy are shaped by uncertainties of our times such as environmental challenges, rise of populism, and changing security landscape. Is AI exacerbating or helping to mitigate these problems, and what role do politics and policy play in these dynamics? 3. Governing grand challenges through Transnational Strategic Partnerships Chairs: Agata Lambrechts (Swiss Federal University for Vocational Education and Training) and Alina Felder-Stindt (Universitat Pompeu Fabra) Description: This panel explores how transnational strategic partnerships (TSPs) are embedded within (European) governance frameworks to address grand challenges. It examines their institutional design and evolution, particularly in sectors of knowledge policy and politics like education, research, and innovation. Contributions will also analyse how TSPs operate across levels and sectors to tackle complex transboundary problems in areas such as climate, digital transformation, and public health. 4. The external dimension of European University Alliances: universities as transnational actors Chairs: Marina Cino Pagliarello (European University Institute) and Andrew Gunn (University of Manchester) This panel examines how European University Alliances extend their reach beyond Europe, focusing on partnerships with extra EU universities and their implications for EU external action. By comparing alliances with strong extra-EU engagement, papers will explore how global offices, states, and non-state actors interact to shape higher education diplomacy and cooperation agendas 5. Science diplomacy’s competitive orientation Chair: Mitchell Young (Charles University) Science diplomacy has traditionally been framed in cooperative terms, but recently there have been calls and efforts to harness it as means of addressing competition and geopolitical conflict. This panel invites empirical and theoretical papers that explore whether and how science diplomacy is a political instrument capable of advancing foreign policy agendas that go beyond cooperation. 6. Data interdependencies and international politics Chairs: Paul Dunshirn (University of Vienna), Alice Vadrot (University of Vienna) The global circulation and use of data involves various public, private, and multilateral actors, constituting relationships of mutual dependency (‘data interdependencies’) that both shape and are shaped by politics. This includes international politics, where the implementation of multilateral agreements requires cooperation between data holders, as well as domestic politics, where novel forms of 'data nationalism' affect the willingness of governments to cooperate. This panel invites empirical and theoretical contributions that examine how such transboundary data interdependencies matter across political contexts, including environmental, technology, and health governance. 7. Governing the Politics of Research and Knowledge Security: Rethinking Knowledge, Power, and Global Academic Cooperation Chair: Cristina PINNA (University of Groningen) This panel examines how emerging frameworks of knowledge and research security are reshaping the governance of academic collaboration, scientific mobility, and open science in an era of geopolitical tension. It invites theoretical and empirical contributions that interrogate how policy instruments, discursive framings, and institutional mechanisms redefine what constitutes “legitimate” cooperation as knowledge moves from a public global good towards a strategically governed asset. 8. Changing Profession, Changing Times Chair: Meng-Hsuan Chou (NTU) and Eva Hartmann (University of Cambridge) The academic profession has experienced profound changes within the last decade. In addition to the systemic features that continue to transform the profession (e.g., overproduction of PhDs, metric-isation of performance assessment, precarisation), the use of AI (in teaching, learning, publishing), the rise of anti-science in the Global North/West and the securitisation of international research collaboration and student recruitment, mark a new phase in the transformation of the academic profession. The panel brings together scholars who are researching this transformation to debate the direction of the academic profession at the transnational and national levels. They are invited to reflect on the implications for the capacity of self-organisation of the profession and its members, including issues of closure, identity, and self-control, as well as academic freedom. 9. Current issues in higher education politics and policies 10. Current issues in research politics and policies We anticipate two additional panels composed of papers submitted directly to the section.