Transcultural Student Research Group 2021 | Call for Application

The Transcultural Caravan publishes the official call for application for the 5th edition of the TSRG 2021 on the topic of “The Impact of the BRI on Europe”.

2021 is an important year for the Transcultural Student Research Group | TSRG: This year the research project will celebrate its 5th anniversary.
After successfully conducting transcultural research projects in Hong-Kong (2017), Uganda (2018), Brazil (2019) and on civil society cooperation in Europe (2020), the focus of the 5th edition turns to the impacts of the Belt and Road Initiative on Europe.
As an ambitious project, the Belt and Road Initiative creates global value chains in a network that connects Europe, Asia, and Africa and that is characterised by diversity in languages, traditions, values, as well as political, social, and economic systems and settings. As one of the most fascinating and risky developments driving the formation of a global society, this initiative represents a global economic, political, social, and cultural experiment with potentially beneficial, but also potentially disruptive, consequences for all involved. Against this background, it is important to contribute to the understanding of what the New Silk Road can mean in economic, political, leadership and cultural terms for the European countries involved.

Case studies
“What are the impacts of the BRI on Europe?” represents the overarching TSRG research question, which will be broken down into different sub-projects. Economic, socio-cultural, political impacts as well as the topic of leadership are the possible angles through which the general research question can be addressed in the specific sub-projects.
The project will be conducted in partnership with the Michał Boym Institute for Asian and Global Studies from Poland. The impact of the BRI will be examined by taking Germany and Poland as case studies. The sub-projects can be run as Humboldt and Elinor Ostrom projects as well as in the context of Bachelor or Master´s Theses.

Time frame
Starting in May, all TSRG 2021 participants will conceptually develop their specific research questions together with experts at LEIZ and The Michał Boym Institute for Asian and Global Studies, as well as individual supervisors (ZU professors). ZU and Polish students will jointly work on these questions in an academic co-authoring process.
The case study research includes a field research trip to Poland in September 2021 (of course, depending on the Covid-19 travel regulations), realized in cooperation with local universities and cooperation partners.
The first results of the studies will be presented during the hybrid Transcultural Winter School 2021. After having submitted their individual Humboldt, Elinor Ostrom, Bachelor or Masters theses, a joint book co-authored by all students involved will be published in the "Transcultural Management Series" by the publisher Metropolis.
Interested?

Please click here to read the full call for applications and to receive more information on the application process.

Contact: Jessica Geraldo Schwengber