Capitalizing on inequalities to build a sound partnership: The story of SISSTEM, an international collaboration between a continental and a small island state university

TThe literature on north-south inter-university collaborations emphasizes on the need for equality amongst partners when aiming to develop successful and sustainable partnerships. However, universities in the north usually differ largely from their counterparts in the south in terms of amongst others access to resources and scale and are therefore often inherently unequal. This is especially true when a large-scale renowned university in Europe, like KU Leuven, establishes a partnership with a young small-scale university located on a small island state, like the University of Aruba, in establishing a new education and research institute in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). In this paper, we investigate how an equal and sustainable partnership between these institutes is established, not despite these inequalities but precisely by recognizing and capitalizing on their inequalities. Based on an explorative case study analysis using semi-structured interviews, we aim to contribute to the literature by reporting on this continental-small island state inter-university partnership and by providing insight into the broader critical drivers and challenges of the partnership.