“Knowledge Production under Conditions of Load-Shedding: Locating
Academic NGOs in Contemporary Nepal”

Date and time: 30th September 2015, 14:00-17:00
Place: Room AA447, 4th Floor, Research Bldg No.2, Yoshida Main Campus, Kyoto University

Speaker:
Dr. Pratyoush Onta
Martin Chautari, Kathmandu, Nepal (14:00-15:00)

Discussants:
Yuko Tsujita, Institute of Developing Economies (15:00-15:30)
Hiromu Shimizu, Kyoto University (15:30-1600)

Open Discussion (16:00-17:00)

Moderator:
Tatsuro Fujikura
Department of South Asia and Indian Ocean Studies, Graduate School of
Asian and African Area Studies, Kyoto University

Contact: Tatsuro Fujikrua email: fujikura[AT]asafas.kyoto-u.ac.jp

Abstract:
Academic non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are already one of the
most important institutional sites of knowledge production in the
countries of the global South. This article defines academic NGOs as
those NGOs which produce not only documentation but also academically
engaging articles, reports, edited volumes, bibliographies, journals
and monographs. It argues that their growth in the recent decades has
taken place amidst the mammoth growth in the number of NGOs in general
for structural and personal reasons. Examples from Nepal are provided
to illustrate, both at the level of procedures and at the level of
outcomes, the kinds of contributions academic NGOs have made to the
knowledge enterprise. I also suggest that the links between editorial
control over what academic NGOs produce and the funding they receive
are more complex than is usually assumed, and that the issue of their
accountability needs to be rendered in a multiple-constituency model
similar to that at work in conventional universities.

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Co-sponsored by MEXT-KAKENHI “Reconstitution of Society during
Post-Conflict Period: Case Studies from South Asia”/ South Asia and
Indian Ocean Studies / KINDAS International Seminar / Nepal Academic
Network (NAN)
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