A labour of love: Cross-cultural research collaboration between Australia and Indonesia

Abstract

Novel combinations of global conditions, issues under investigation and research alliances require constant reassessment of how to conduct cross-cultural research. Here we recount an exploratory investigation considering cross-cultural research between Australian and Indonesian researchers. This paper sets out a range of considerations for practitioners of cross-cultural research between our two countries. This investigation supports intentions to develop trans-disciplinary climate change adaptation research but is applicable across multiple research topics and disciplines. We engaged a small multi-disciplinary mix of researchers, from both countries, conducted two initial focus groups, and subsequently involved participants in drafting of this paper as an exploration of how being cross cultural could manifest. We highlight that cross-cultural collaborations occur in environments of both cultural differences and power differences. Four main strategies emerged for dealing with the challenges (or opportunities): working respectfully, being reflective of cross-cultural research practice, being flexible, and learning about culture. Overarching these strategies, we found cross-cultural research requires considerable extra (long term) effort to tackle and that this is sustained by researchers' intrinsic motives to care for people and place, making this type of research a distinctive labour of love. Finally, we found similarities between cross-cultural research and climate change adaptation research (even when conducted within one country) where both endeavours call for boundaries of places, cultures and disciplines to be crossed in order to effectively engage with complex topics and environments. Negotiating the liminalities here often defies set formulas and requires a willingness to engage with and ‘muddle through’ the messiness. Our findings will be of value to those undertaking cross-cultural research across a wide range of issues.

INTRODUCTION

This paper relates an exploration of the challenges, drivers, and motivations of cross-cultural research collaborations between Australian and Indonesian academics in research conducted between the two countries. The underpinning research began with an intention of progressing climate change adaptation in Australia and Indonesia. Climate change mitigation and adaptation needs urgent engagement on several fronts (Pörtner et al., 2022). Inter-disciplinary, transcultural and transnational collaborative research is needed to identify effective solutions to what are multi-faceted, ‘wicked’, boundary crossing challenges in a rapidly changing climate (Levin et al., 2012; Mustelin et al., 2013). Australia and Indonesia are large neighbouring countries that are both highly susceptible to the impacts of climate change (Buchori et al., 2018; Bureau of Meteorology and CSIRO, 2020; Djalante, 2018) and adaptation measures are essential to reduce vulnerability to impacts (Pörtner et al., 2022). Effective adaptation is often challenged by a lack of information, limited resources, and implementation of effective adaptation strategies (see for example Chiputwa et al., 2022; Lyle, 2015; Ofoegbu & Ifejika Speranza, 2021; Wiréhn, 2021). Advancing adaptive solutions will require appropriate cross-cultural approaches that are responsive and respectful.

In this vein, a group of Tasmanian¹ researchers, interested in advancing cross-cultural and cross-boundary research on climate change adaptation, saw an imperative to work beyond their small island state in Australia. Indonesia, is a neighbouring, archipelagic country rich in lived island experience, including of climate motivated emergencies, and one with which some (but not all) of the initial team had prior experience and affinity. The intent of this project then was to understand the critical characteristics of cross-cultural research to advance collaboration between Australia and Indonesia, ultimately for climate change adaptation research.

There is considerable scope and interest in cross-cultural research collaboration between the two countries (Sebastian et al., 2019). Our initial Tasmanian-based research team's intention had been to travel to Indonesia to meet with Indonesia counterparts and learn about research-related cultural interactions and to meet and discuss climate change and related environmental issues with Indonesian academics. This activity was to be supported by a small research grant through the Australian Department of Education. However, soon after the grant was awarded, in March 2020, the University of Tasmania and the Australian Government put in place travel restrictions to limit the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, effectively halting the possibility of travel long term. Given this, we modified our project. Our original questions about where, and how, to start engaging with Indonesian researchers to research adaptation to climate change impacts were still imperative, and an opportunity emerged to focus on understanding the practices of cross-cultural research as a basis for further work on climate change adaptation.

Our focus on international cross-cultural research emerged from our initial Tasmanian team having concerns about the practicalities of collaborating at distance, including negotiating and developing research between two different countries and their distinctive national cultures.² We knew we needed to engage with nuances that were as yet poorly understood and would normally be identified through closer interaction, including power dynamics generated through gender, race, capitalism and geopolitical relations. These power dynamics are not always well attended to in international research collaborations (Apostolopoulou et al., 2021). In particular, we were aware that cross-cultural research collaborations such as we hoped for needed to respond to a history of colonial power relations in both Indonesia (Heryanto, 2018) and Australia (Hall, 2014) and between them (Caluya, 2019; Muflichah & Mackinlay, 2020).

There are a number of pitfalls that might present to the cross-cultural researcher when considering de-colonising research. Undertaking cross-cultural research will require researchers to grapple with hegemonic epistemologies (often colonial legacies themselves) that demand ongoing reflexivity (Kelley, 2021). Arriving in new cultures to conduct research demands confronting legacies of past exploitative or problematic research practices in potential partner communities, such as limited follow-up, short lived engagements and lack of respect or acknowledgement of partner knowledge and experience (Woodward & Marrfurra McTaggart, 2016). There is also a need to pay attention to imbalances in capacity and resources between researchers from high-income countries and low- and middle-income countries to address ‘norms [that] are extractive and woefully outdated’, that without challenge, will leave cross-cultural research ‘a robustly colonial enterprise’ (Urassa et al., 2021, p. 668). Tackling these related issues of coloniality is foundational to conducting ethical research (Clark-Kazak, 2023) and requires investing in relationships and building trust: issues critical for effective cross-cultural research (Woodward & Marrfurra McTaggart, 2016).

It was with this spirit of reflexive relationality, an awareness built on previous experiences and from previous wise guidance, that we undertook this research (See, for example, Apostolopoulou et al., 2021; Bawaka Country et al., 2018; Woodward & Marrfurra McTaggart, 2016). This awareness and the restrictions for travel led to an exploratory project utilising two video-conference based focus groups, involving researchers with cross-cultural Indonesian-Australian research experience. This paper relates findings from these focus groups and aims to provide insight about motives behind, inherent challenges of, drivers for, and strategies that progress, effective cross-cultural research between the two countries. The work also aimed to test ways that we can begin to decolonise cross-cultural research by ensuring all voices are acknowledged. Indeed, as our project progressed, we moved beyond hearing and acknowledgement to engaging in active participation in analysis and reporting (discussed in more detail in methods).

In this paper, we first present relevant literature that outlines key approaches to cross-cultural research collaborations as a background. Second, we describe our method, which pursues a cross-cultural and discursive exploratory approach where participants become collaborators and co-authors. Third we relate insights from our focus groups that support effective cross-cultural research. Finally, we discuss the significance of findings for cross-cultural research and its practitioners. We assert that motivations, and particularly motivations of care – love – are critical in sustaining cross-cultural research. Further, this is not an easy care, but one that requires major extra effort from researchers to push through the messiness of working in between cultures. For us there was also serendipity seeing that the liminal nature of cross-cultural research aligned with our particular interest in the liminalities of both cross-disciplinary and climate change adaptation science. This work is also timely, providing reflection on conducting cross-cultural research during the COVID-19 pandemic – an event requiring urgent attention in intercultural research (Kulich et al., 2021). The ultimate intent behind this paper is to contribute guidance on how we go about cross-cultural research work on urgent issues such as (but not limited to) climate change adaptation. Understanding cross-cultural differences is essential to cross-cultural research and foundational for effecting change.

BACKGROUND AND LITERATURE REVIEW

To undertake this work and build the necessary research collaborations, we needed to understand the constraints and enablers of effective international research collaboration. Past experience has identified that ‘team dynamics in international research collaboration should be carefully identified and managed before studies are begun’ (Chen et al., 2013, p. 145). Further, the ‘quality of relationships between researchers and between researchers and informants’ should be maintained throughout (Easterby-Smith & Malina, 1999, p. 76) and researchers should be reflective in order to gather insights not only about those being studied but also about the filters and assumptions used as researchers (Easterby-Smith & Malina, 1999). Katz and Martin (1997) identify a number of benefits and costs of cross-cultural research collaboration. These benefits include ‘sharing of knowledge, skills and techniques’ and ‘a closely related … transfer of knowledge and skills’ (Katz & Martin, 1997, p. 14), the creative stimulation of ‘a clash of views, a cross-fertilisation of ideas which may in turn generate new insights or perspectives’ (Katz & Martin, 1997, p. 15), intellectual companionship, extension of intellectual networks and greater visibility and exposure of work. Conversely, collaborations are likely to require greater financial outlays, more time and collaboration efforts (Cummings & Kiesler, 2007; Graef et al., 2019).

Research across borders can be carried out for comparative analysis, but this practice in turn raises issues for methodological choices and how these interact with the unique circumstances in each country being compared and challenges for achieving equivalence (Buil et al., 2012). A working premise here is that in collaborations no one country or group of researchers can assume their knowledge is suitable in another place or culture. This may seem an obvious premise, but colonial legacies carry with them practices of an imposition of ways of doing from one group on another (Kanngieser & Todd, 2020; Kelley, 2021). Our position, as a group with experience in various aspects of societal change, is that for climate change adaptation we need to work together as equals, be able to inform, share and collaborate as freely as possible, avoid unhelpful stereotypes (Said, 1978) and avoid making assumptions that ‘our way of knowing and working is best’. Cross-cultural engagement needs to be underpinned by ‘mutual respect, trust and continuous learning’ (Rhodes, 2014, p. 207).

Beginning from this basis, that cross-cultural collaboration is essential to ensuring culturally effective country to country collaborations, a critical part of working across or with multiple cultures is to ensure we understand the cultures and context involved (Graef et al., 2019). Understanding how to engage cross-culturally is essential as while ‘what cross-cultural … researchers do (the content of research) is important’, it is ‘just as important’ to pay attention to ‘how it is done’ (Teagarden et al., 1995, p. 1282). There are unique challenges to international collaborations that need to be addressed through cross-cultural understanding. Researchers need to ask diverse questions including how are ‘constructs or theories investigated relevant in each research context? How should the instrument used to collect the data (for example, a questionnaire) be translated? What samples should be selected? How should the data be collected? Are the measures used in the study invariant in each unit of analysis investigated?’ (Buil et al., 2012, p. 224). Further, when examining ‘what happened’ and the ‘how’ of conducting cross-cultural research, a range of challenges within research teams spanning workplace, work culture and discipline and matters of cultural sensitivity need to be considered (Chambers, 1994; Chen et al., 2013; Easterby-Smith & Malina, 1999).

Cross-cultural research between countries with different colonial histories also requires that researchers understand the power dynamics and legacies that have influenced research cultures and contexts. For our Australian-based researchers, approaching Australia's Indo-Pacific neighbours with awareness of such histories is essential, as is considering how such relationships can unfairly, and even unwittingly, produce benefits for those from the global ‘north’ disproportionate to collaborators from the ‘south’, even with good intentions from researchers (Halvorsen, 2018). For example, Boshoff (2009) notes in a review of such work that for collaborative research in Central Africa, 80% of published papers were with collaborators from outside the region and 35% with collaborators from countries that were past colonial rulers, and that local contributors more frequently took on fieldwork components of research, as opposed to the writing of papers. The hegemony of English language in global scientific publications is also an expression of these dynamics acting to reinforce the power imbalances (Halvorsen, 2018). Addressing these latent histories requires ‘continued exploration into trans-linguistic and –cultural practices … [to] … support collaboration and diverse perspectives’ (Fedoruk et al., 2018, p. 8). Of course, team members will have unique ontologies and epistemologies that have been influenced through their specific lived experience that will further influence these dynamics.

METHOD

Our approach was to learn from what people have already done, to ask what challenges academics found in their cross-cultural research, and the practices they have used to overcome barriers to sustain their research. Two online focus groups³ that each ran for 2 h, were conducted with discussion being semi-structured – guided by key questions but with flexible space for participants to explore. These are referred to as FG 1 and FG 2 here. Each focus group included four invited participant academics experienced in Indonesian-Australia cross-cultural academic work (and who were citizens of either Australia or Indonesia) and three University of Tasmania researchers from the original team. Focus groups explored issues and practices related to establishing international cross-cultural research collaborations between Australia and Indonesia and sought comparison of Indonesian and Australian research cultures and of methods that could be applied (or that are used) when practicing cross-cultural research. All participants provided written consent to take part prior to the focus groups.

As we needed academics with particular experience (working internationally between Indonesia and Australia specifically), potential participant academics were purposively recruited from the research team's networks. Participants invited and who took part had considerable experience of academic culture and practice in both Australian and Indonesian universities (or comparable cross-cultural experience). The groups included a mix of Australian and Indonesian academics. In total there were seven participants – four Australian and three Indonesian – three males and four females. The participants ranged from early career to late career academics. All participants had experience researching in cross-cultural teams and in the other country (that is, Australian researchers had experience conducting research in Indonesia and Indonesian researchers had experience conducting research in Australia). Of the participants, there was a range of experience and disciplines represented including those with experience in cross-cultural research work across cultures other than just between Australia and Indonesia. We anticipated that this mix of experience would be useful in the discussion to take advantage of the knowledge base of experienced researchers with lived experience of university cultures in both countries. Three of the Tasmanian research team participated in both focus groups. Two of these researchers had extensive cross-cultural research and teaching experience.

Each focus group had two sessions. The first session was about developing insights for improving collaboration and asked four questions: (1) What is your understanding and/or experience of cross-cultural collaboration? (2) Do you think cross-cultural collaboration (in your research area) is beneficial (or not) and why? (3) What do you see as the opportunities and challenges in a cross-cultural academic environment? (4) How do you address these challenges? The second session sought insights about research culture and differences between Australia and Indonesia and asked: (1) What do you consider the main differences of research culture and practice between Indonesia and Australia? (2) What opportunities and challenges do these differences present? (3) How do you address these challenges?

The focus group format allowed collective development of rich understanding of various experiences and dynamics of cross-cultural research. Semi-structured discussion allowed greater depth of discussion of issues, providing space to both develop insight into meanings and rationales behind actions, and allow rapid feedback and testing of ideas between participants (Nyumba et al., 2018). Choosing an online environment for these sessions was driven by COVID-19 pandemic imperatives. The use of online focus groups has been progressing for some years with successful application in a wide variety of disciplines (Morrison et al., 2020). Our focus group discussions were conducted online using the online meeting tool ‘Zoom’, with one held in late November 2020 and one in early December 2020. Both focus groups were conducted in English language as a language all attendees could speak (consequences of this choice to use English and to not engage translators in the process are discussed later).⁴

All focus group discussions were recorded, transcribed verbatim by an auto-transcription service and transcriptions were further quality checked and refined by researchers checking the auto-transcriptions against the recordings. In this study, qualitative data management software ‘NVivo’ (Release 1.2 [426] QSR International Pty Ltd) was used to store, manage, and code interview data.

Analysis was initially led by three of the original research team to identify themes concerned with the three broad research questions of motives, challenges, and strategies that researchers experience with cross-cultural research, the focus of this paper. Early during analysis, conversations about co-authorship were had with focus group participants. Co-authorship was proposed as a way to better respect participant input, to deepen inquiry, and to assist to (begin to) decolonise research (see Farbotko et al., 2023 and Pope, 2020 for further discussion on this). These conversations, and ultimate co-author decisions,⁵ were guided by our understanding as researchers of the potential power imbalances and colonialising traditions that could unsettle constructive/effective discussion and analysis. Cross-cultural experiences and decolonising conversations and explorations in our past research were all helpful here and informed and reinforced our intentions to ensure respectful research, but also respectful analysis processes. In doing this, the development, testing, and refinement of analysis contributed to deeper discussions on the ideas first raised in the focus groups.

Discursive data from focus groups was analysed using thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006, 2023) where deductive coding involved carefully reading through the interview transcripts for data pertaining to motives, challenges and strategies that researchers experience when conducting cross-cultural research. In the deductive phase of analysis, a social constructionist lens was applied where we were interested in how motives, challenges and strategies were reported, perceived and explained. This guided analysis to consider themes produced across focus group discussions in initial deductive coding for data related to motives, challenges or strategies.

Inductive thematic analysis was also used to gain a holistic understanding of relationships between cultural and power differences and strategies that researchers used to manage these in cross-cultural research. Given the participatory nature of this study, and paper, this inductive thematic process was iterative and inclusive. Ongoing discussions about the themes being generated in the analysis and their relationships to each other involved reflection about the differences in perspectives and world views that we as researchers brought to our analysis. This iterative process of back-and-forth analysis was important given there were qualitative social scientists and quantitative biophysical scientists in our team, which resulted in the challenging and questioning of themes and approaches in ways a mono-disciplinary team would not have. This iterative and collaborative analysis process continued through writing. We have written this paper in the first-person plural reflecting us as both subject and object, and also as observer and participant.

Challenges that confront cross-cultural research practitioners

A diverse group of challenges impacting cross-cultural work identified during the focus groups are presented here grouped in two key themes: challenges of cultural difference and challenges of power difference. These challenges were communicated partly in response to a direct question in the focus groups that asked what challenges we might expect to face in conducting cross-cultural research between Indonesia and Australia (a core motivating question in our research) and also via surrounding discussion in the focus groups. What we call challenges of cultural difference refer to challenges experienced negotiating cultural differences such as distinctive (and often novel) language, norms, behaviours, and practices. What we refer to as challenges of power differences are particularly considerations of the effects of gender, class, wealth, and colonisation.

Challenges of cultural difference

The focus group discussions yielded insight into challenges that were in part expected by the initial group of inquiring researchers. These were obvious cultural differences raised in relation to Australia and Indonesia: social hierarchy, concepts of time and time management, bureaucracy, and language. However, it should be noted that in each case while discussions started with observation of difference, these were most often followed with observations of contradictions of the initial – and often stereotypical – observation and with important supporting nuanced detail, as described in the following paragraphs.

Differences in social hierarchies between the two countries were discussed with suggestions that Indonesia was more likely to have higher levels of stratification and concern for deference than the flatter styles of social hierarchy that were believed to operate in Australia. This is consistent with findings of cross-cultural difference using Hofstede's four dimensions (Hofstede, 2011) in which the ‘two countries are poles apart’ and an ‘Australian working in Indonesia will find’ formal hierarchy structures and less participatory and more centralised decision making (Jones, 2007, p. 6).

Understanding of time and in particular cultural differences regarding punctuality and expectations of the lengths of time various activities might take was another set of cultural differences raised. Time as a cultural construct, particularly perceptions and use of time, also relates to the fourth thematic of challenges surrounding differences in bureaucracy (and social hierarchy and language) – where cross-cultural differences can be apparent in the different time it takes to ‘get things done’ as well as the difference in emphasis on punctuality between Australia and Indonesia. A number of references were made to jam karet (literally, ‘rubber time’) a colloquial Indonesian expression reflecting a certain flexibility around meeting times. This is sometimes used by Indonesian people to contrast with a more rigid punctuality of non-Indonesians. However, again, cautions about stereotypes were noted after the focus groups because these time practices are very context and circumstance dependent. For example, flexibility of time is relative to social position and is different between urban, professional, rural and informal settings.

Cultural differences causing challenges noted above are generally understood and approached as bodies of knowledge that researchers consider accessible and that can be overcome through acquiring the right knowledge and approaching new situations with understanding and acceptance (FG 1 & 2). Some of this knowledge is relatively easy to acquire by engaging with counterparts. Some cultural knowledge acquisition though, such as learning language and cultural practices, requires longer time commitments and is more challenging. While the forms of cultural difference and knowledge raised were considered broadly straightforward, several of us cautioned about approaching or viewing cultural difference as being between two hegemonic cultures. It was noted that each country has extensive cultural diversity within. This means, for example, ‘experience in Sumatra … was quite different, has been quite different than … experience in Java’ (FG 2). This was framed as a need to be careful not to generalise by ‘reducing people to tropes’ (FG 2). Avoiding stereotypes might seem obvious but in the focus group and subsequent discussions it came up multiple times. Another related aspect raised during discussions was the lack of priority put into training of academics before we embark on cross-cultural international research, and the value of this training for those who had received it.

As well as the broader cultural differences, it was observed that researchers in cross-cultural research collaboration also confront differences in how universities conduct research, both between the two countries and within them. The significant differences raised in our focus group discussions were differences in human research ethics approaches and approaches to interdisciplinarity (being less common in Indonesian universities). Again, as these differences were discussed, important counterarguments were made that while, in general the difference between countries had some validity, there were obvious and numerous exceptions. For example, observations about Indonesian universities being more bureaucratic than Australian universities were finessed in subsequent discussion making it clear that there is wide variation in levels of bureaucracy between universities within each country. This included the observation that sometimes smaller Indonesian universities are easier to work with in some bureaucratic regards than either Australian universities or the larger, more prestigious Indonesian universities (FG 2). Recent structural changes to how Indonesian government research is organised, with the recent establishment of a new central national organisation, BRIN (Badan Riset dan Inovasi Nasional), also serves to highlight how these differences are not fixed in time.

Perhaps the hallmark of a cultural distinction is in different language. Language differences can present significant challenges for cross-cultural research. This can be both when there are differences in levels of language proficiency between researchers, or, more acutely, when participants do not understand another language at all. In our case our focus group was conducted in English because two of the three Tasmanian research group participants had no Indonesian language skills. All the invited experts (both Indonesian and Australian) for the focus groups had English language skills and Bahasa Indonesia language skills. Holding the discussion in English also meant we did not need to engage translators. However, in retrospect this was problematic, reflected in an observation by one of us that an Indonesian's well developed English skills can still mean anxiety about not matching the proficiency of native English speakers. Conducting the focus groups in English leaves participants for whom English was not their first language with additional emotional and language processing demands. English carries significant power as a global language, particularly in the sciences (Halvorsen, 2018), and has a heritage associated with colonial power dynamics (Kitchin, 2005). We found changing the power dynamics around language to be particularly challenging. While we have separated cultural difference from power difference as two separate themes here, considering language as a pivotal difference, it is clear from the above that the two can be very entwined.

Challenges of power difference

The second set of challenges that emerged were those of negotiating the unequal power relations that exist in cross-cultural research. There is a range of power differentials arising from patriarchy, colonisation, capitalism and globalisation which challenge cross-cultural research. Working with these dynamics entails extra effort on top of just negotiating different cultural practices, as practitioners confront the social structural positions arising from differences in, for example, income, education or employment roles (Kunovich, 2004). These differences are always present in cross-cultural research and have implications for working relationships within any project. Two challenges that stood out from the focus group discussions were first, the difficulty in acknowledging these power dynamics and second, once acknowledged, the difficulties in changing problematic dynamics. Further nuances and contradictory dynamics were identified, and we note these below.

A strong theme in discussions was acknowledgement that unequal relationships exist as a result of colonial histories and structures operating within and between the two countries. In Indonesia, it was observed there are latent, pre-existing barriers related to ‘colonialism’ and/or privileging of westerners. In cross-cultural research, this was particularly signified by the discussed problem of ‘parachute academics’– international academics who drop into Indonesia (in this case), collect data and return home to publish findings, accruing disproportionate knowledge and prestige to already advantaged individuals, institutions and countries (FG 1). Such unequal relationships were observed by focus group members over time during their research careers and manifested in the different standing of researchers from different countries within international teams. There was reporting in the focus groups of unwarranted assumptions of expertise and privileging of ‘white’ and ‘global north’ knowledge (sometimes referred to in Indonesia as ‘outside country’ knowledge – diluar negeri) with one participant observing incredulity in others at the presence of western researchers in Indonesia: ‘why would [western researchers] be interested in doing research in Indonesia?’ (FG 1). Such assumptions greatly challenge promotion of local expert knowledge and equal inter-country partnerships.

In reflecting on our focus groups, we noticed that it was only in one that colonisation received considered attention and this was after it was expressly named up. It was as if colonisation was something not to be talked about, but once it was named up (early in that one focus group) discussion returned to it a number of times throughout the remainder of that focus group session. Race was also discussed after colonisation was mentioned, not as a direct concept but through use of parallel language, being alluded to with ‘white’ being mentioned several times in that focus group (but again, not explicitly in the other focus group).

There were people from colonising cultures and traditions and colonised peoples in the focus group. Therefore, there were people who had benefited and people who had been subjugated via historical and contemporary colonialisation, and this we realised bought with it emotional weight with naming colonisation and racism and the impacts that these practices have in the conversation. There was a sense in the focus group that (de)colonisation was a tricky issue that was ‘circled’ around for a while before being named cautiously. But once acknowledged, and it was made clear that there was both awareness and concern about colonising effects, it then became an acceptable basis for discussion. It was clear the entire group discussing these issues understood that colonial and racist legacies had major impacts that were difficult to work with. Despite the valuing of respect in the focus group, the unequal relationships between Australian and Indonesian academics and research teams were considered ‘very hard to flip’ in practice as ‘the traditional ways of, of working and collaborating aren't equal’ (FG 1). This difficulty of changing these (neo)colonial dynamics is also, perhaps, illustrated in the preponderance during focus groups of discussion about Australian researchers conducting cross-cultural research in Indonesia, rather than Indonesian researchers conducting cross-cultural research in Australia, even though the choice of participants, research question and focus group questions were intentionally designed to be inclusive of research in both directions. These power dynamics were recognised as being further complicated when gender was considered, especially with different forms and approaches to patriarchy playing out between and within the two countries. It was suggested that possibly gender was less of a challenge for cross-cultural research than issues from colonisation. However, the extent to which they intersect was somewhat difficult to discern.

These challenges of unequal power are noticed in practice and resisted by academics on either side of this dynamic. It was noted that resistance to parachute academics and knowledge extraction and exploitation exists, including through efforts by the Indonesian government to require high level approvals by responsible ministries for foreign academics to undertake research in Indonesia (FG 1). Amongst the Australian academics in our group, there was recognition that while these approval processes can be onerous (and are not popular in some parts of Australian academia), they are nevertheless beneficial. They support the Indonesian government and Indonesian academics and research institutions to control and redress power imbalances in cross-cultural research endeavours, protecting vulnerable communities within Indonesia, and ensuring more thoughtful, committed and effectively decolonised cross-cultural research is undertaken (see Davies, 2013).

Financial motives were also raised as a challenge, not so much from differences in access to funds, but in shared recognition that researchers in both countries faced limitations and expectations surrounding finding and keeping funding. While these varied in some ways (Australian researchers might have access to greater levels of funding), there was also recognition that funding was often a shared motive for doing research.

Finally, in addition to the two sets of challenges outlined above, there is an overlapping challenge for cross-cultural research practitioners. There is extra effort required to develop new (cross-)cultural knowledge to negotiate the inevitable hesitations, conflict, confusion, mismatches, and often significant power imbalances. This effort can be considerable, adding to the time and cost of doing research, and to potential risks for projects. For researchers negotiating these differences, this requires significant additional effort when compared to research that occurs within more culturally homogenous settings (or inside one particular country); and often requires significant extra personal time and (non-reimbursed) expenses. Some of these challenges can be significant barriers (such as language) and require varying degrees of extra effort to overcome. Activities and practices of researchers working cross-culturally clearly required more effort than would be needed in in-culture research (where teams share more socio-cultural background). Researchers were not only working across two (or more) cultures with all that entailed, they also, if they were to ensure successful collaborations, had to learn about the different dynamics at play in the universities they worked in and with. Cross-cultural engagement increased the complexity of projects, their associated workloads and the time projects took to complete. Extra motivation and sustaining effort will be addressed further, but first we consider the main strategies for dealing with challenges outlined above.

Cross-cultural research strategies

A diverse range of strategies and practices were described in our focus groups as ways of meeting challenges mentioned. These are grouped into four broad approaches for effective research collaborations: working respectfully, reflexive practice, being flexible and learning culture. A feature of discussion about challenges was that navigating richly complex, cross-cultural research with a respectful, caring and learning mindset while also being ‘effective’ is often hard and even a source of ‘anxiety’ for researchers. To help with these challenges, a number of strategies were noted in our focus groups.

Strategies that support respectful approaches included a need to be ‘on-the-ground’, spending time and building relationships (and trust) in order to develop shared understandings (even to work through misunderstandings); slowing down speech so that those engaging in their second or non-mother tongue language can stay engaged and contribute effectively, and knowing and using intermediaries, especially those from one culture who have experience of another and are therefore able to mediate misunderstandings and conflict. Including intermediaries in the form of translators also helped to mitigate the problems associated with conducting English-only cross-cultural research noted earlier. Especially in situations where researchers are expected to bring their expertise, and hopefully most lucid and confident thinking, providing spaces where researchers can speak (and listen) in their most comfortable languages and have them be translated by high quality translators is likely to improve outcomes, as well as generating more equitable research spaces.

Reflecting on (research) practices being important to ensure research quality was raised multiple times in both discussions as a valued strategy, with detail shared about how this was achieved. Reflection was regularly used to understand and engage with matters of power. Some of us as social scientists or humanities specialists commonly use reflexivity in research, but this was not the case for all of us. Nevertheless, a need to reflect on one's own practice was elucidated in both groups across disciplinary backgrounds. A ‘sort of openness, and listening, and being flexible is important’ (FG 2). Reflexive practice included being aware of context, constructively critical when observing academic processes, critical of our personal position and practices, and responsively changing practice. Reflexive practice, for example, led to awareness of the problems of limiting local partners’ roles to fieldwork or data extraction. Another key reflexive practice was ensuring caution when using generalisations. An example was focus group participants starting with a generalisation of ‘unprofessionalism’ or ‘hierarchical’ being levelled at researchers from one country but then being reflected on and leading to more nuanced discussion about the variation and conditions of variation within and between countries. Qualities and skills of humility and acceptance of mistake making (and willingness to make them) were also expressed in the focus groups as being important here.

Being flexible, and related to this, being able to regroup and adapt when there are challenges, was noted as important in cross-cultural research. There is commonly a need for creative workarounds and replanning of approaches. A number of us reflected on observations and experiences of using differences in systems between countries to find workarounds to cross-cultural research challenges. One example was an early career academic having a post graduate degree given a slight (still legitimate) modification in its labelling in Australia to emphasise a discipline that would match the person's earlier Indonesian degrees. This continuation of work in a single discipline was necessary for employment in Indonesian universities, while some flexibility in the Australian university on specific disciplinary assignment for those particular studies meant a strategic relabelling was possible.

Flexibility was also needed when engaging with different ways of dealing with time in Australia and Indonesia. Further to earlier findings, differences in punctuality between Australia and Indonesia were related with descriptions of a range of experiences and ad hoc approaches to ‘dealing with’ and ‘accepting’ these differences and related outcomes. Flexibility played out in shorter time frames, such as when planning when to arrive for a meeting, and in longer time frames when, for example, planning the time certain bureaucratic processes can take, or how long it might take to achieve the aspiration of a ‘normal and neighbourly’ relationship between Australia and Indonesia (not even fully materialising at the Australian end after a number of decades). These time related challenges called for flexibility and use of ad hoc strategies or back-up plans.

Dealing with mistakes also required strategic engagement. Discussants observed that Indonesians can assume that ‘westerners’ (which a large majority of current Australian researchers could be labelled), ‘know everything’ and that participation in cross-cultural research provides opportunities to realise that this is not so, as the ‘westerners’ are observed learning and making mistakes (FG 2). Additionally, ‘westerners’ have to learn to be comfortable with making mistakes (FG 1). In Indonesia, it can be assumed that a ‘westerner’ will already know what is needed in research situations, and so Indonesian researchers may not share information, assuming it is already known. However, when Indonesian researchers see that other researchers make mistakes there emerges a chance for more equal and dynamic exchange and collaboration.

Alongside working respectfully, thoughtfully (reflexively), and flexibly in cross-cultural research, in focus groups a number of us emphasised the critical need for cultural education. This education sets up researchers with a generic set of cross-cultural collaboration skills – a ‘toolkit’ – and ensures culturally specific knowledges that significantly progress cross-cultural research.

There were speculations about the potential differences in cross-cultural experience Australians or Indonesians might have. However, both countries have, in various ways, much cultural diversity within and so it is likely that even when a researcher comes new to cross-cultural research between Indonesia and Australia, they will have various lived cross-cultural experience to draw on.

A few of us referred to experiences in cultural knowledge training as part of pre-engagement preparation we had done for various inter-country engagements, with government-supported training programs seen as important pathways to longer term engagement with and between countries. As noted above, the importance of learning language was particularly emphasised by several of us.

Sustaining cross-cultural research effort – the role of motivations

We set out to conduct research on climate change adaptation in places beyond our home island which led us to questions of how to conduct collaborative, cross-cultural research – what the challenges might be and what might be suitable strategies to overcome these. The previous two sections have outlined the findings that emerged addressing these questions. Approaches to challenges had a notable theme cutting across them all and that was the effort required to undertake cross-cultural research. This theme raised questions about how effort is generated and sustained and what motivates researchers to confront and deal with challenges described? Part of the answer emerged via mentions of individual researchers' motivations in focus group discussions and realisation during analysis of how these underpinned sustained cross-cultural efforts they made.

Here we describe in more detail the motivations that presented themselves through our focus groups and their subsequent analysis. Ideas of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation help describe these motives, providing a simple heuristic. Intrinsic motivations as those that do not require external rewards or threats to be sustaining. They come from within, and the work is carried out as a worthy end in itself. Extrinsic motives are external drivers. These two forms of motivation are likely subject to complex interplay but are nevertheless usefully described as discrete motives (see for example Benabou & Tirole, 2003).

Intrinsic motives were pertinent to understanding what drives researchers to persist with cross-cultural research despite its sizable challenges. Altruistic references to ‘care’ and related expressions, and evidence of passion, values and commitments to place, people and culture were often expressed as intrinsic motivators. This care was expressed in specific ways including concern for global environmental challenges, marginalised communities, being ‘neighbourly’ with nearby countries, as well as closer personal connections.

Extrinsic motives were also important amongst our group of researchers and were often embedded in discussions of organisational and institutional matters (that included ethics, inclusion and safety policies and training). These motivations were likely to be expressed in terms of the requirements of the researcher's organisational policies and rules and career imperatives. These included the need for career and organisational advancement through conducting successful research, getting grants and funding, and publications. Discussion in focus groups about human research ethics displayed elements of both the extrinsic and intrinsic motives as researchers sought to balance competing extrinsic motives of meeting institutional ethics protocols and (often aligned) intrinsic goals. Whilst these extrinsic motivations appeared a key factor in focus group participant's motivations, participants in this study were self-selecting, and this recruitment method may have influenced the ‘types’ of people who chose to participate. Therefore, whilst significant, further research into this finding would be needed to better understand motivations of cross-cultural researchers.

In the focus groups, researchers noted the importance of publishing as specific to a particular country, although others noted this as being universal in academic life. Seeking out cross-cultural research might also align with continual calls by institutions for academics to specialise and find niches. At other times, there was a tendency within the focus groups to talk about extrinsic motivations as existing features of university organisational structures that came from others and just had to be followed/obeyed. Interestingly, in the focus group discussions there was a tendency to problematise extrinsic motivations and attribute them to ‘others’, seeing, for example management and senior staff pushing for international (high ranked English language journals) journal publications, career advancement and lucrative funding contracts. Extrinsic motivations were also implied to be pushing ‘parachute’ academics to engage poorly in cross-cultural research collaboration including using in-country partners as data collectors rather than as true collaborators.

The pursuit of international publication was a particular example of these noted as an extrinsic motivation for Indonesian partners to seek collaborations. One participant suggested that for Indonesian researchers being involved in international publishing was very important and a ‘real stress’ of institutional life for an Indonesian academic. International publications carry significant prestige which has flow-on effects for individual Indonesian researchers as well as their institutions (and nation). Such national level extrinsic motivations were not explicitly articulated in the focus groups; however, their existence was suggested as an extrinsic motivation that our focus group cross-cultural researchers are cognisant of.⁶ It is certainly the case that literature on cross-cultural collaboration between Australia and Indonesia often leans on national interest motivations to frame and justify research – and other forms of cross-cultural engagement (see for example Monfries, 2006; Thomas, 2019).

We note two ways in which effort is exerted: practising care and being with, and within, the messiness of it all. It was apparent in both focus groups that there is deep care involved in the commitment to cross-cultural research. This was expressed by all involved – both Indonesian Australian researchers. We found (and then focused on) a significant inner theme of ‘care’ as a driver for cross-cultural research collaboration. The tone of the focus groups reflected a value centred consideration and thoughtfulness for others. It is possible that this is an emergent property of cross-cultural research. Respectful or considerate collaboration with others might be what works and therefore persists in the field, and/or perhaps it is a ‘follow the rules’ of cross-cultural understanding – being tolerant, understanding local values, not imposing external values while pursuing the betterment of others – and/or it could be reflective of values that researchers have and that brings them to cross-cultural research. In multiple instances participants appear to ‘bother’, to make the cross-cultural effort, because they care. As mentioned previously, this additional labour is required to navigate both the cultural difference, and power differences. There is also a demand for labour due to the need to spend the extra time good cross-cultural research requires – time to listen, time to know, time to understand, time to build relationships – as well as the financial resources to sustain this.

Addressing unequal power arrangements was acknowledged in the focus groups as being difficult, effort-ful work – power imbalances challenged researchers. Even the most basic communications could be subject to concern and questioning. For example, attempting to decipher a ‘yes’ requires consideration of underlying power dynamics – is the ‘yes’ freely given? Even when researchers begin cross-cultural research collaborations with the clearest of intent to eradicating or limiting power imbalances, it is very difficult – ‘it's, it's really, really hard to flip it’, as noted above (FG 1). It seemed that care or good intent set the scene for greater angst and effort on behalf of researchers. However, it also seemed that a willingness to name up the legacies and presence of colonial structures (and issues of race) that the cross-cultural research team must negotiate is useful, potentially expediting decolonisation in a way that builds shared understandings and collaboration. This ‘naming up’ of matters of race and colonisation is consistent with how Maclean et al. (2022) describe the use of intentional ‘positionality’ in their research practice to support better partnerships and research outcomes.

Overall, the extra labour required of cross-cultural research – specifically, this care, and more so in this sense, a labour of love – was a striking underpinning theme that wove through both focus group discussions. Recognising the emotional labour of ‘caring’ is important if we are to heed calls for intercultural scholarship to ‘cross borders with knowledge, agency and care!’ (Kulich et al., 2021, p. A5). This all-pervading need for extra labour highlighted how important strong motivations are for cross-cultural work. Being open to a motivation built on the ‘regenerative ethic of love’ brings ‘pragmatic and healing possibilities’ to work weaving through such complex challenges as climate change adaption (Mouat, 2022, p. 310). Motivations such as love, and care are, we argue, critical dimensions needed when negotiating between places of difference inherent in cross-cultural research. Claiming love and care as fundamentals is well supported. We identified love as an animating motivator for researchers in our study. This is consistent with others who have deployed love as an intentional decolonising strategy (Makhubu & Mbongwa, 2019; Tebrakunna country & Lee, 2019) and as a critical way of connecting between culture – and between place and people (Smith et al., 2020). This concern with the connecting between difference, in turn, brings us back to our initial research impetus of cross-cultural research in climate change adaption.

Working in the liminal spaces of climate change research and cross-cultural collaboration

Above, we explored processes of research when working with more than one country and in between countries. Cross-cultural research involves being at the edges, not entirely within one but between two – it is a liminal practice. The insight we developed about navigating cultural in betweenness in turn assists us to better understand how to approach climate change adaptation and environmental problems. These too are a deeply complex, boundary crossing and challenging concerns (Palmer & Stevens, 2019) that require working in between and across shared (unbounded) problems that needs us to work in liminal spaces. Notably, there is growing awareness of the need to understand the already richly complex biophysical phenomena of climate change to be matched and supported with knowledge of interrelated social phenomena such as in climate change economics (Stern, 2018), governance (Berrang-Ford et al., 2019) and cultural processes (Parsons, 2019). This in turn involves researchers working across disciplinary ‘cultures’, as well as working across the cross-cultural dimensions needed to engage in shared global problems. This working ‘across’ engages liminal spaces not as ‘lines of separation’ but rather as ‘zones of interaction’ (Howitt, 2001, p. 240).

Taken together, our intentions to engage with cross-cultural research into climate change adaptation arrived at a ‘mess’, where ‘[e]very problem interacts with other problems and is therefore part of a system of interrelated problems’ where such a ‘mess’ can rarely be addressed ‘by independently solving each of the problems of which it is composed’ (Ackoff, 1974, p. 21). Cross-cultural research strategies identified are also applicable for climate change adaptation research. Much as we engage the in-between spaces as we bridge between cultures, climate change demands negotiating ‘the impersonal, apolitical and universal imaginary of climate change projected by science … [and] … the subjective, situated and normative imaginations of human actors engaging with nature’ (Jasanoff, 2010, p. 233). Cross-cultural research, like many a wicked problem, requires a bridging of imaginaries (cultures) of understanding, such as in moving between linear technical problem solving and a collaborative sharing of inputs, processes and knowledges (Head & Alford, 2015). And, as we have argued, care and love.

Entering into cross-cultural research collaborations will likely involve initial ‘strangeness’, however, as one focus group participant noted, while the process of cross-cultural research might be strange at first, over time it will become ‘normalised’ and ‘taken for granted’ (FG 2). For researchers, here we can perhaps also draw on our experience with the scientific endeavour itself in confronting this strangeness. As Merton (1968, p. 4) notes, there is a ‘rock-bound difference between the finished versions of scientific work as they appear in print and the actual course of inquiry followed by the inquirer,’ with the finished product a black box hiding the messiness—‘the intuitive leaps, false starts, mistakes, loose ends, and happy accidents that actually cluttered up the inquiry’. This reflects well the events leading to the research reported here, as we ‘muddled through’ after being ‘blindsided’ by a pandemic and its implications (and sadly, the passing away of the initial team leader and project instigator). But it also reflects well the experience confronted by researchers tackling complex wicked problems, such as climate change adaptation.

CONCLUSION

This paper set out a range of considerations for practitioners of cross-cultural research collaboration. It highlights that cross-cultural collaboration includes engagement with both cultural differences and power differences. While the former can be approached by being responsive and learnt or acquired with cultural knowledge, the latter can be particularly challenging. Regardless, they all require effort to overcome. This in turn led us to consider the motivations of cross-cultural researchers. The challenges were significant and the strategies for dealing with them were not easy to implement or guaranteed of success. Cross-cultural research collaboration invites us to consider that the complexity is not just in the domain of our research topic, or even in the bumping together of different cultures, but within ourselves as we reckon with ‘a history that formulates particular kinds of interpretation and representation’ within that requires us to grapple with ‘being a guest [and] a trespasser’ (Kanngieser & Todd, 2020). The effort required to work effectively in this space highlighted the importance of individual motivations for undertaking cross-cultural research. Motivations are important for understanding why cross-cultural research is undertaken and how it is sustained, and we considered them to be more substantive than just a ‘strategy’ – they presented as foundational in sustaining effort in cross-cultural research. In turn, we suggest that researchers and their supportive institutions recognise and nurture these motivations to sustain and benefit from cross-cultural research. Finally, we also observe the similarities between negotiating the in betweenness of cross-cultural research collaboration and climate change adaptation (as well as many other complex or wicked problems), and the messiness this entails. Cross-cultural research collaboration can be messy work that, critically perhaps, is likely to be sustained through a labour of love.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Rebecca Harris was the senior chief investigator on this project. She passed away on the 24 December 2021, before this paper was finished. We wish to acknowledge her passing and her contributions to this project, and more generally to global climate change research and governance. Thanks to Setia Budi and Steve Miller who participated in focus groups and reviewed the draft paper and to Catherine Elliott for contributions to initial project and research development. The focus groups were conducted as per ethics approval at the University of Tasmania by its Human Research Ethics Committee (ref – S0023490 [H-72607]). Finally, we wish to gratefully thank the editorial team and reviewers of this paper for their time and thoughtful suggestions and challenges to improve our work. Open access publishing facilitated by University of Tasmania, as part of the Wiley - University of Tasmania agreement via the Council of Australian University Librarians.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST STATEMENT

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT

Data sharing is not applicable to this article as no datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.

Endnotes:

¹Tasmania is an island state to the south of the Australian continent that is part of the federated nation state of Australia.

²While the impetus was to focus on the cultural differences faced by academics working between the two nation states we recognise that these imagined ‘national’ cultures occur in nation states with rich and diverse cultural differences within arising from their unique histories and geographies.

³While we have called these sessions ‘focus groups’, the relatively open nature of the discussion amongst expert peers assembled also gave these sessions something of the character of an expert workshop.

⁴All participants and one of the UTAS researchers could speak some Indonesian and some English, one UTAS researcher could speak Mandarin and English and one English only.

⁵Four of the seven participants chose to become authors and three choose to remain as participants (although in some cases, they still gave feedback on an early draft manuscript).

⁶In discussion within our authorship team, we have recognised that an implication of publishing in English here is making our research less accessible to Indonesian researchers. To address this, we are committed to translating and publishing the final results in an accessible Bahasa Indonesia form.